Will’s Title is Too Long

As you likely have noticed, the content in this site has been seriously lacking for awhile. Even back in April when I was churning out stuff everyday, it was nowhere near the quality that I wanted it to be. Sadly, becoming an adult has given this site a smaller priority in my life everyday. Thus, I am telling you now that this will be my last post for awhile. I will not be posting more WPA game charts (each takes at least 30 minutes). I will not be following the Gardy Decision Tracker (which has been slacking anyway since I haven’t even watched a game in 2 weeks).

Basically, long ago I told myself, “Self, if there is ever a week in which the Twins decide it would be smart to carry 13 pitchers, and if the Twins decided to draft someone from The George Washington University in the same draft in which they select someone I watched graduate from high school with my sister, and if, on top of all that, Delmonstosity hits a home run during that week; well, self, that is when it is time to stop blogging for awhile.”

So I’m not going to write for awhile. Will I never write again? Probably not. I’m sure at some point I’ll get the creative juices flowing for a random entry here or there. But now that I have a wife to share my free time, house to maintain, a lawn to mow, and too many pitchers in the bullpen (none of which was the case back when I started blogging), I just cannot give this site much of my time.

Thanks for helping nourish this hobby for several years and for giving me way more visitors than I ever expected. It has been a lot of fun, but it’s time for me to move on…

Slowly getting caught up. Now I’m only one series behind! Please cut me some slack because Sheenie and I officially became homeowners yesterday. We now own a house in South Minneapolis and will be spending the month moving our belongings from our tiny apartment in St. Paul into our spacious residence in Minneapolis. I can finally return to the good side of the river! (Also, it’s pretty humorous that we bought a house in South Minneapolis and this will be the farthest away from the Mississippi River that Laurie has ever lived in her life*.)

*excluding college

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Michael Cuddyer’s single
Most Important Twins Pitch: Delmonstrosity shows just how horrible he can be

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Craig Monroe completes the improbable two-out comeback
Most Important Twins Pitch: Miguel Olivo’s double

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Michael Cuddyer’s single
Most Important Twins Pitch: David DeJesus bounces into a DP to end the third
What Are These Graphs?

Sorry, I missed these games while relaxing up in Nisswa. Thanks, Dan, for the invite to your cabin!

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Mike Lamb walks in the 2nd
Most Important Twins Pitch: Gary Sheffield hits a solo homer

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Alexi Casilla homers
Most Important Twins Pitch: Magglio Ordonez’s third inning double

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: The Dude Abides in a Major Way
Most Important Twins Pitch: Carlos Guillen’s second inning homer

Sheenie and I were fortunate enough to attend Wednesday’s game because of Scot’s generosity. Here were a few observations from the game:

1) Wow, what a weird atmosphere. Every where you turned, there was at least one beach ball on the loose and in the top of the third, there were about 50 flying around the upper deck in left field.

2) I’ve never seen anyone win Twingo before, yet it took just 1.5 innings for Scot’s wife! Then, the Twins conveniently had planted a photographer right behind us.

3) Nice to meet Beau.

4) On the way inside the Dome we observed the TwinsGeek being harassed by Metrodome security for walking along the sidewalk. Pretty pathetic showing by the Twins. He wasn’t selling anything, he was merely walking - BY HIMSELF - on the sidewalk when two officers came up behind him to force him to relocate. I implore you to purchase Gameday’s if you are not currently already doing so. You’ll get some great reading material during the games and get to spite the Twins incompetent PR approach.

5) We jokingly called Everett’s error a single in the 9th before shockingly seeing it listed on the scoreboard as an error. RonDelmon deserved one, too, in my book for the foul ball he missed. And OKGOmez absolutely botched Shelton’s third inning single. It took less than a week after last Friday for the Twins to be back to handing away extra outs like candy in the field.

6) Security chased and ejected two different fans activities which garnered much more attention than the action on the field.

Well, I’m heading up to Nisswa to take advantage of even more free hospitality from some good friends so no more updates until Monday at the earliest.

Gardy Decision Tracker: Joe Nathan was asked to intentionally walk Ramon Vazquez in the ninth. Seriously. Verdict: It worked out, but it’s still a giant Eh?

Gardy Decision Tracker: RonDelmon continues to play every single inning of every single game while contributing very little. Verdict: Fail.

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Alexi Casilla bounces out to end the third (seriously)
Most Important Twins Pitch: Michael Young broke an apparently unwritten rule in baseball and hit a ball over the fence

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Justin Morneau ties the game with a single despite having no protection behind him in the batting order as he’s protected by someone whose talent is apparently not only NOT limitless but apparently easy to doubt
Most Important Twins Pitch: Josh Hamilton broke the same rule as Michael Young. Something the Rangers seemed to do frequently.
What Are These Graphs?

I think Monday night’s game tried to destroy what is remaining of the Gardy Decision Tracker. As twayn wrote on SBG:
“He spits in [logic’s] face while flipping it the bird… and kicking it in the nuts.”

Oh well, here goes nothing…

Gardy Decision Tracker: Three different pitchers combine to turn a one-run led into a one-run deficit in the eighth inning. None of those three pitchers are making over $40million to help the Twins win close games. Verdict: Fail

Gardy Decision Tracker: In the ninth inning and still trailing by a run, Gardy lets Jesse Crain pitch into, and out of, trouble while the $40million man sits idly in the bullpen. Verdict: Eh.

Gardy Decision Tracker: Gardy uses OKGomez to pinch-run in the eighth as the tying run while on second base. The he used Mike Redmond and Craig Monroe and eventually gets the tying run. He used all his bullets rather than sitting on them for a change. Verdict: Success

Gardy Decision Tracker: The $40million man gets used in the 10th inning of a tie game at home with no chance for a future save opportunity and keeps Texas from scoring. Verdict: Success

Gardy Decision Tracker: The $40million man then gets removed after just 5 pitches (FIVE, fünf, cinco, cinque, ivefay) for Juan Rincon - who now requires more than 5 pitches just to throw two strikes to a batter. Rincon loads the bases and the only out he gets comes on an effed-up bunt. Verdict: Mindbogglingly Stupid and Extraordinary Failure

Gardy Decision Tracker: Little-used Bobby Korecky comes in and cleans up Rincon’s mess. Verdict: Great Success

Gardy Decision Tracker: Having Lost the DH after the bottom of the ninth, Bobby Korecky hits for himself and slaps a single. If the leadoff man had reached base, Livan would have been called upon to pinch-hit and bunt. Verdict: Rock and a Hard Place

And moving onto Tuesday’s game…

Gardy Decision Tracker: Alexi Casilla is sent with a 1-2 count after Joe Mauer had fouled off a couple of two-strike pitches. Joe slaps a hit-and-run single beautifully through the hole. Verdict: Success

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Alexi Casilla’s 3-run homer to silence the Dazzle Man’s criticism
Most Important Twins Pitch: Milton Bradley’s game-tying double in the eighth

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: OKGOmez smashes the first pitch for a triple (anybody else enjoying the “let Gomez swing away era” a whole lot more than the “force Gomez to show bunt on every other pitch era”?)
Most Important Twins Pitch: Chris Shelton strikes out to end the second inning (seriously)
How Do I Make Sense of These Graphs?

So buying a house is a lot of work. After cruising neighborhoods for a couple of months, Sheenie and I started actually stopping at open houses in April. Then a few weeks ago, we started looking along with an agent who had the inside scoop. A week ago today, we accepted a counteroffer from a seller and have jumped into the plethora of steps (I like using that word) to get the sale finalized. The home inspection has been completed with a resulting amendment attached to the sale. The loan at our final offer was secured this morning with the bank. The title people are springing into action. An assessor is on the way. A SOLD SIGN WENT UP YESTERDAY. Lots of fun stuff.

I cannot wait to move back to Minneapolis. While I have nothing against St. Paul and enjoy working in the city, there is absolutely nothing to do here. Every single time we go to meet friends or do something interesting, it seems like we’re headed across the river (or to Chatterbox about five blocks from the river). Granted, June is a rare month in which we’ll take advantage of Xcel with the dinosaur show and REM/Modest Mouse coming to town, but that’s about the second time in over two years it’ll be nice to live within walking distance of the facility.

Plus, Sheenie will have access to a lot of great trails as she continues to train for the 3-day since we’ll be living just two blocks away from Minnehaha Parkway. When we started looking, we had focused on the Nokomis area but when that search seemed to stall, I decided to poke around Tangletown and closer to the lakes on the off-chance we could actually afford something there. A few weeks later and I’m still surprised and delighted that we were able to actually find a house there in our price range. Now, we get to close at the end of the month and then start moving and buying all the stuff we put off for awhile. Item #1, of course, will be the grill. (Actually, it’ll probably be Item #1A right after a new bed, but who knows how that’ll work out.)

In Twins related news, wow did Justin Morneau have a great week! On the other hand, wow did almost everyone else really suck. Delmon Strosity’s “placement” was productive in Colorado, but he still was pretty miserable yet again. Also, don’t look now but Mike Redmond might be turning into Derek Parks.

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Joe Mauer’s first inning single
Most Important Twins Pitch: Clint Barmes slaps a triple into the corner

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Adam Everett’s seventh inning double
Most Important Twins Pitch: Willy Tavares slaps a sixth inning RBI single

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: justin go boom
Most Important Twins Pitch: Todd Helton responds

How Do I Make Sense of These Graphs and Numbers?

I apologize for being so behind on all of these games. It’s a pretty hectic week at work (Senior/Commencement week!), but then the students leave and the work will slow down a little bit. Of course, I will not be able to stay on top of things immediately next week as a friend has graciously offered to let Sheenie and I join him Memorial Day weekend up at his cabin in Nisswa. How can anyone ever turn down that offer?

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Justin Morneau’s first inning single and JD Drew’s error
Most Important Twins Pitch: Manny being Manny in the first

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: Justin Morneau’s sixth inning double
Most Important Twins Pitch: Lyle Overbay’s gapper in the fourth

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: justin go boom
Most Important Twins Pitch: Matt Stairs hits a granny

Most Important Twins Plate Appearance: OKGOmez has his flyball caught at the warning track in the 10th
Most Important Twins Pitch: Joe Inglett loops a single just past Tolbert
What Are These Graphs?