The Big Kiss-Off

AMR gave up his blog for awhile, he was so convinced he had jinxed the Twins. Brad Zellar believes the Twins are playing just to torture him, "because it's clear the mess of this season to date has been purely a personal thing between the Twins and me." Batgirl operates under the wacky delusion that offering promises of her Boyfriend of the Day award through her TV screen may inspire her boys to end the pain of an interminable all-night contest, and score a damn run already, so she can go to bed. She also prays for favors from the Tony Gwynn Fairy, patron saint of Jacque Jones. Clearly, Twins Territory is a nation in need of a Rally Monkey to call its own, or else a good psychologist. My three compadres are all earnest and sincere in their superstitions, I'm sure, but they've got it all wrong. This is not about you, my friends. Oh, no. What the Twins are doing this week, they do only to toy with me.

Yes, as the Twins embarked on a road trip to New York and Boston in the last week of July, I proclaimed that the following three weeks would be crucial to the season. Crucial. Of course, just to spite me, the team proceeded to lose 5 of 6 on the trip, then 3 of 4 upon coming home to host the A's--the team our Twins are trying to catch at the top of the Wild Card standings. Sure, the Red Sox handed them a couple wins in the Metrodome, but the boys wasted the gift by losing the next series in Seattle. Despite winning 2 of 3 in Oakland last weekend, the Twins offense still looked woefully inadequate in scoring just 5 runs in the series; and, heading to Chicago, the team stood 5th in the Wild Card race, 7 games behind the leading Oakland A's. If that ain't a team that looks ready to pack up and make vacation plans for October 3rd, well, what would you think?

I broke down and admitted my team was done. Nothing left but to play for pride, I said. Yeah, I said it. And my team heard it. This, I know. For just to make me look like a fool--again--the Twins since that morning are the winners of 4 straight. They swept the hated South Side Be-yaaatches, in Chicago, capped off by a dominant performance from Cy Young, the One True Ace of the Twins rotation. After beating the Mariners tonight, whaddya know--the Twins have climbed back within 3.5 games of Oakland. Who knows, maybe even the White Sox are within shooting distance.

For those inclined towards fantastic daydreams, and since the Mariners are in town, I invite you to think back on the immortal "Refuse to Lose" Mariners of '95, a team that treaded around the .500 mark for most of the season and trailed the Angels at one point by 13.5 games. On this date of August '95, the AL West standings looked like this:

Team	W-L	Pct.	GB
Angels	64-41	.621	--
Rangers	54-50	.519	9.5
Mariners	53-51	.510	10.5
Athletics	49-57	.462	15.5

Look a little familiar? The standings stayed something like that for another week, as the M's still trailed the Angels by 10.5 games on August 25. But the Angels had already started to sink that week, losing 4 of 7 games. When the M's suddenly got hot in the last week of August, they would begin their inexorable rally to the top of the division, seemingly refusing to lose even while the Angels kept losing again and again. Such reversals of fortune have been known to happen, and perhaps this year the cosmic wheel will favor the Twins again. But they can never hear that from me.

I have written you off, boys. You've been nothing but a great disappointment to me this season. I shan't waste another precious second of hope on you. I'm putting away my 'TC' cap and putting on the Purple. Yeah, I'm on the Vikings bandwagon, baby. Suuu-per Bowl bound! Whooooo! Drop me a line when you got yourselves a real cleanup hitter and some veterans who know how to win, Twinks. Til then, you're dead to me. We're through. Hear me? I have given up. ¡Ya basta!

Think you'll make a monkey of me? Go on, do your worst.