Pelfrey, Hicks, Sano BOOOOOOM!!!!!

I find it hilarious that there are actually discussion groups saying that we should send Sano back down to the minors because he doesn't know how to hit major league pitching.

Forget the fact that he's been our most productive hitter for the last month. He's our DH! Jim Thome was our DH for three seasons and he was striking out all the time. Sano is just a kid. There's plenty of time to teach him more of the basics. BUT -in the meantime- he can keep on driving in runs and hitting home runs and winning games for us. Take last night for instance. SIX RBI, TWO home runs --AND... he was still patient enough to draw a walk in the eighth inning to load the bases when he was down 1-2 in the count. That kind of mature batting is amazing to watch AND he's still batting close to  .300!!!

Speaking of mature batting, has Aaron Hicks finally learned how to hit major league pitching? His fielding in center has been highlight reel good, night after night. But his hitting from BOTH sides of the plate has been spectacular. Here's the stats:

Home Field Advantage

With the Twins comeback win last night, something happened in baseball that's never happened before in all of baseball history. ALL the teams played yesterday and ALL the home teams won their games.

That's pretty cool.

Byron Buxton

Remember I warned everyone about signing Torii Hunter for this season? Uneducated fans said it was a good thing. I said it was a bad thing. Though Torii was having a pretty good season on offense, he is now standing in the way of progress.

Let me explain...

Byron Buxton hit .417 in three games with Triple A Rochester during the weekend on a rehab assignment. Now that he's established he's healthy, the Twins on Monday officially optioned him to Rochester.

I wish they hadn't done that. I understand the reasoning behind the move, but I don't agree with it.

Start with this: A healthy Buxton plays. You don't have Buxton in the majors to sit on the bench. I agree fully with that.

Which means that to justify having Buxton in the majors, one of the current three regular outfielders needs to sit in any given game: Eddie Rosario, Aaron Hicks and Torii Hunter. (One could DH one of them, but then you get into the Miguel Sano-Joe Mauer-Trevor Plouffe trio splitting first base, third base and designated hitter.) Presumably the Twins brain trust is loathe to tamper with the outfield setup.

There is also the service time factor, but that is counterbalanced by the fact that the Twins have now burned the first of Buxton's three option years. Ideally they'll never use all three option seasons, but the first is now gone. Buxton's call-up came late enough that service time shouldn't be a genuine factor anyway.

No, the real reason they shipped Buxton back to the minors is that Rosario and Hicks also need to play to develop, and they have committed too much (financially and emotionally) to the return of Hunter. This is why I disliked the Hunter signing last winter. Sooner or later, he was going to get in the way.

It took into August for that to happen, which is later than I expected, but it's official now. Today, he's in the way.

It's bad enough to let a 40-year-old who is hitting at a league average level block a prime prospect. But I fear that the Twins will double down on that bet and bring Hunter back for 2016.

Which makes his initial signing even worse.

Torii WAS good. Buxton could be GREAT. He should be playing on the major league roster right now, especially with the pressure of a real pennant race gone.

I'm not following the games much any more, but the behind the scenes moves are still interesting to pick up on. 

Financial Responsibility

I'm sick of the Twins, and the Vikings don't yet matter, so I'll commenting on a Sporting News article that my wife sent me this morning.

Lion's receiver Ryan Broyles has a $3.5 million contract with Detroit, but he and his wife live on a budget of $60,000 a year. That includes house payments, car payments and a small baby.

Unlike other pro sport multi-millionaires who find themselves bankrupt shortly before or after retirement, Broyles decided to spend wisely and invest most of his money in secure long-term management funds.

He doesn't want to have to play football the rest of his life or worry about what happens next.

I LIKE this guy. I like him a lot. It's never about how much you make or don't make. It's about how much you CHOOSE to spend and how much you then have left to invest.

Go Ryan!

Anticipation

Much of the joy in life comes from the potential of what's coming. I used to dwell on Vikings or Twins losses much too long thinking that's just what fans do. Now, the Twins season is all but over with all the starters ailing and average relief pitching failing to provide the extra relief that's now needed. They even fell BELOW .500 again for the first time since they were 11-12 early in the season.

My current attitude is now, "so what?"  I probably won't watch many more games this season, and just wait for the playoffs instead. It's actually kind of a relief NOT being a fan like I used to be.

And this way I can get ready for the Vikings. Speaking of which: preseason games are ALWAYS difficult to watch, and last night was no exception. Bridgewater was good in his one series BUT missed an easy pass that would have kept a drive alive. Even in preseason it's hard to watch a lapse in concentration like that.

The Vikings won I hear, but sitting through a whole game of players I'll never see during the regular season doesn't interest me that much. I didn't last much past the first quarter. Preseason games are just  extended practices. As such, they don't merit much attention.

I THINK one of the main reasons that sports don't rank as high on my list of things to watch anymore is there are so many good television programs to watch instead, more than my wife and I could ever hope to watch. Where geeks everywhere are anticipating the return of new Star Wars movies to the pop culture universe, I'm actually more excited that FOX has decided to bring back X-Files with all new TV shows.

I'm looking forward to both, of course, but 8-10 hours of good television will always be better than a 2 hour movie once a year.

If they are GOOD, of course.

If they aren't, I can always look forward to next year's Twins. The anticipation is almost always better than the actual product. But the potential keeps us all hopeful.

.500

The Twins failed miserably Saturday. I stopped watching at 4-1.

Vikings tonight.

WOW!

We were at my Aunt Maybelle's for supper last night and, avid Twins fan that she is, we got to actually watch a great Twins game.

Well, the part we watched was great. That 6-run inning was great. Pelfrey was not. And by the time we left her place the Twins were still ahead but the score was 7-4 with Cleveland threatening to score more. By the time we got home and settled the Twins were down 9-7 so we stopped watching.

Then after our show was done at 9 pm we switched over to the game again with the Twins up 10-9! We got to see Perkins pitch a shaky bottom of the ninth that included three strikeouts AND the save.

One above .500 again.

We'll wait and see what happens next. Go Twins!

AND VIKINGS TOMMOROW TONIGHT!!!!

WHOOOOO!