For discussion of this week’s two-game series against the Tigers.

For discussion of this Twins-Royals series.

Liriano is set to pitch on Sunday, Slowey has been put on DL. I believe I’ve got the games listed right in the sidebar with correct starting pitchers. Looks like Boof pitches Saturday and Liriano on Sunday. For the Detroit series, Blackburn will pitch on Monday, Baker on Tuesday. That’s how it stands now.

Tonight’s game is rained out, has been rescheduled to June 9th at 1:05pm.

And now I see that Friday’s game is radio only now, previously I’d had it listed as airing on FSN. So no Twins on TV ’til Saturday. Grrrr. I can listen to Dazzle and Gordo tomorrow night, but it’s not the same.

It’s rainy and cold here in Minneapolis. Earlier the rain turned to snow for a while, at another time the rain turned to ice pellets. Now we’re back to cold cold rain. Kevin got to come home early today because the power kept going out where he works, but he also had to run some errands in Uptown on his way home. Kevin takes the bus– this means he ended up walking around to run the errands and change buses and all that fun stuff.

When he arrived home he said “this is some of the worst weather I’ve ever been in” and was very surly (for Kevin). Windy with sleet and ice pellets and rain– not his favorite thing ever. I think he’s taking a nap now after learning the Twins wouldn’t be on.

Lots and lots of snow is predicted to fall tonight and tomorrow and this weekend. How will I know it’s truly spring if I can’t turn on FSN and see Dick & Bert?

We’re watching on our DirecTiVo, and I couldn’t very well start watching ’til Kevin got home from work, so we’re behind real-time here, but I’m gonna try to blog as I watch so it’s kinda like I’m liveblogging, but not.

Twins vs. White Sox in Chicago
Scott Baker vs. John Danks

One good thing about the games that are broadcast on WFTC: No Ron Coomer! (Also no Telly!) The WFTC guy that’s sometimes on is bland, but inoffensive.

Danks first MLB game was against the Twins a year ago, his first MLB win was also against the Twins (not the same game). Huh.

Hi A.J. Congrats on hitting .458 so far with 7 RBIs. Now knock that off while playing the Twins, okay?

Top of the First

Oh, Gomez. So young and speedy and . . . caught off base. Sigh.

I would not be ashamed to wear an “I (heart) Joe Mauer” shirt and I’m not even a teenage girl. We call Joe “Joe-Ma” sometimes because we sat behind some guys at the Dome once who called him that all through the game– normally things we hear at the Dome are not the sorts of things we’ll repeat (except to mock them). I was unsure of this “Joe-Ma” nickname at first, even though it kinda dumb, but eventually I decided I like it.

Two former pitchers agree that pine tar is needed on a night like tonight? I am shocked! And no, they aren’t talking about using the pine tar on bats.

I think I like this Danks guy.

Bases loaded for Delmon . . . and that’s a hit! Yes! 1 RBI, which is Delmon’s third on the year. Kevin’s in the kitchen retrieving dinner, I should probably back the game up on ye olde TiVo so he can see this. This “not-quite-live blog” is getting less live all the time.

Dinner tonight: Chicken a la vodka farfalle. From a bag. One of those frozen bagged meals which we like to call “Meals for Depressed People” because they’re just the thing when you have no energy whatsoever. Dump contents of bag in pan, turn on heat, and you have dinner in 10 minutes or whatever. And it’s actually tasty (or at least it is to a depressed low-energy person).

Kevin: “Being unable to hit and unable to hit for power, that pretty much defines a Twins designated hitter.”
Laurel: “CARIG is 0 for 7 against Danks and 1 for 11 on the year, so Gardy thought he’d be a good DH for this game. What a great idea!”

Twins 2, White Sox 0.

Bottom of the first

Go-go-Gomez! What a great catch! Excellent. Would Torii have had that? Perhaps not. Isn’t it fun when Dick gets so excited he shouts as he calls the play? He’s been a Twins fan for a long time so I totally get it.

Well that was a pleasant inning for us and a good way to start the game.

Twins 2, White Sox 0.

(more…)

Here we go, our first series against the BiWhite Sox. Chat about it here.

They’re talking to Denard Span, who says he’s going to “not try to do too much” many times. He really says “too much” so often that we’re now calling him “Too Much” around these parts. “Too Much Span”.

Bert is wearing a big birthday cake hat and playing with a stuffed birthday cake toy that plays “Happy Birthday” when you squeeze it. Awesome. Kevin wondered if FSN had to pay for using “Happy Birthday” just because of the music in that toy, but when we come back from the break they play a full version of the song (with lyrics) while showing clips of Bert. So yeah, they’re paying for the song.

And this is apparently as far as I got before I gave up liveblogging the game. Not far, I know. I believe we paused the game to do something else and returned to it hours later. And I didn’t return to this post ’til later still.

I do recall looking up from whatever I was doing when I heard Bert say “Papa Smurf from Fantasy Camp brought me cake.” This had me looking at Kevin to try to ascertain if he heard the same thing I had, and he confirmed it with a look of confusion and maybe a little bit of fear. After that, Dick & Bert discussed what size of piece (of cake) Dick prefers.

I know there was other silly Dick & Bert stuff, but the Papa Smurf bit is what stuck with me.

As for the game . . . sigh. Happy to see Justin go yard again. Loved Joe-Ma’s first at-bat where he fouled off a zillion pitches. Still loving Tolbert. Boof! gave us another quality start. But we couldn’t score the runs we needed. Argh!

Johan Santana could commiserate with Boof re lack of run support. The Mets only scored a single run for Johan, he only gave up one run, but the Mets lost today. Bummer. Johan did hit a double and make some good fielding plays, in addition to making guys sit down. I’m gonna miss being able to watch Johan– the free preview of MLB Extra Innings this week was really nice, especially because I got to watch Johan start two games. Love Johan, but can’t justify forking over the almost $200 for the package; pity there’s not a smaller package where I could just get Mets games on SNY. Perhaps I should look into MLB.TV.

(If you’re Bert.)

Happy 57th Birthday, Bert Blyleven!