Farewell to the Dome, Swastikas and all

With the Twins playing their last three games at the Dome this weekend (most likely), I wanted to give the Homerdome a little love.  Make no mistake, the Twins will be losing a MAJOR home field advantage when they move into Target Field.  Don't get me wrong, I'm very much look forward to it, but the sheer mental advantage they had any time the Tigers or White Sox game to town will be missed, and in a lot of ways so will the dome

This isn't a best games ever list or a most meaningful list.  If you want there, check here or here.  This is a list of the first 10 memories I thought of when I decided to write this post nearly ten minutes ago, not all of them positive.  A good amount of my list overlaps with the two I linked, but this is merely a personal list.  Your mileage may vary.  Whatever that means.

10.  Some Random Royals game, 2000.  It wasn't an especially meaningful game, since the Twins sucked and I actually have no memory of who won or lost, but I remember this one because I had my first job after college, I called in sick, and The Egyptian and I went to this 12:05 game, bought two $30 tickets for just $30 total, and got hammered all afternoon.  It was great.

9.  First time I saw my boy Mussina pitch, late 90s.  I loved this guy from day 1, as I detailed in the post I wrote after his retirement, so getting to see him pitch for the first time was a treat.  I think he had a no-no for about five innings and ending up tossing a really nice outing - which I think he did everytime he faced the Twins. 

8.  Knoblauch returns, fans revolt, 1998.  Another game I was very fortunate to be at, it was quite the black eye for Minnesota fans who, let's be honest here, are mostly homer morons anyway.  If you recall, the brilliant tards in left field threw hotdogs, beer bottles, and whatever they could find at his stupid traitor head, causing Metrodome announcer guy to say, "Now cut that out."  It was pretty memorable.

7.  My first game ever, early 80s.  I remember they played the Orioles and I asked my dad why the team was named after a cookie, and I remember the final out coming when a Twin hit a foul pop that ended up hitting a speaker and coming back into play and was caught.

6.  That Eric Fox guy hit that home run, 1992.  I'm sure you remember this one - extremely light-hitting outfielder takes Aguilera deep to win a game for the A's in a pivotal series against the Twins, franchise takes a tumble.  Seriously it was nine years before they had a winning record again.  I wasn't at this game, but it still sticks with me. 

5.  Cal Ripken Jr.'s 3,000th hit, 2000.  This one is memorable not only because of the milestone, but because I was in attendance with Dawger and a couple of other people I don't remember, and he threw such a tantrum when everybody stood up and applauded and ripped his ticket in half after the game was over rather than keep it as a souvenir.  This night has spawned uncountable arguments about how "overrated" Ripken was an how he was basically "the same as a Cuddyer", and the world's greatest cartoon.

4.  Game 6, 1991 World Series.  It was starting to feel all over, but the much overhyped Puckett statement of "jump on back" was real enough based on his performance.  Both that catch against the plexiglass and the game winning home run in the 11th and are burned into my brain.      

3.  Game 7, 1991 World Series.  Another memory of a game I didn't attend in person, but not having this game on here would be criminal.  Pretty much universally cited as one of the greatest World Series Games in history, I remember watching it in my parent's basement.  Interestingly, it doesn't stick out to me as much as the other two games on this list despite being a better game.  But really, it's amazing if you think about it.  Jack Morris coming out for that 10th inning and shutting down Atlanta once again is really one of the last truly studly acts by a starting pitcher.  Other than Jim Leyland, name a manager who would send his starter out for a tenth inning of a world series?  There isn't one.  

2.  Game 7, 1987 World Series.  I actually don't remember a damn thing about this game other than the groundball to Gaetti to end the game, but that I remember very, very well.  I remember running out to the garage and honking the horn on my parents' car over and over again in celebration (come on, I was eleven years old), and feeling the sheer joy that can only come from a child seeing his team win a championship.  Incredible.  I really, really, really hope that someday in my lifetime they can win another one, but I know it won't be as special as this.

1.  Twins Sweep Sox for Miracle Comeback, 2008.  Probably seems weird ranking this as a better memory than the two World Series wins, but I was actually here for this game, it happened recent enough that it is still fresh, and I was old enough to really appreciate it.  This is the only entry I had the blog for, and I wrote about it immediately after I got home here.  Re-reading that post, I'm fairly certain that is the most emotion I have ever put into a post (not counting hate as an emotion.  or rage), and I know it's the most positive sounding I have ever been.  I still get giddy remembering it.  People high-fiving in the parking lot and in the streets after the game, spontaneous chants continually breaking out, and just a feeling of absolute euphoria.  this is just a taste of what it was like (skip to 2:40 and turn the volume up):

Seriously, I'm a bit terrified of how I'm going to react if the Twins win another series in my lifetime.  I'd be like a Mr. Burns in that episode where he gets shot full of drugs and Homer thinks he's an alien.

So farewell Metrodome, you get a pretty bad rap, and in a lot of ways you sucked big time, but I'm going to miss you quite a bit.  Since I'd rather shank myself in the eyeball than attend a Vikings game, I'm guessing I'll never be at the dome again after Sunday's game.  Well, at least until the next Monster Truck Rally. 

(as I post this the Tigers just lost and the Twins are up 9-0 in the fourth, things are getting interesting).

Sad Day

It is with a heavy heart that I comment on the upcoming retirement of Yankee pitcher Mike Mussina. One of my absolute favorite pitchers, and players, of all-time.

As a kid, one of my first little league teams was named the Orioles, and so I latched on to them as my team of choice behind the Twins and kept them there until Mussina left for the Yankees. It absolutely broke my heart that my hero would take the money and sign with the evil empire. As I got older, I was able to look at that decision with a more level head, and realized that it made sense for him. He was from Pennsylvania, and was always a homebody and a hometown boy, living in the same town he grew up in and even coaching his old high school's basketball team. New York was a drive away, rather than a flight from Baltimore, and given that he grew up a Yankee fan as well, I was able to forgive the decision, and went back to being a big fan.

It started one afternoon in 1991, when I was home and watching the Saturday game of the week, which pitted my beloved Orioles against the not-hated yet Chicago White Sox, who featured another favorite of mine, Tim Raines, getting on to the tail end of his career. The pitching matchup would be another favorite, knuckleballer Charlie Hough vs. a rookie pitcher for the Orioles named Mike Mussina. I tuned in to watch Hough's knuckler baffle hitters, always a fun thing to watch. It did, as Hough turned in a masterful performance, going the distance and giving up just five hits and 0 runs. But what I walked away from that game with was an absolute love of Mike Mussina and a kid's confidence that he was going to be one of the greats of all-time. In his very first career start, he went 7 and 2/3 and gave up just 4 hits and 1 run on a homerun to Frank Thomas. He was amazing, not overpowering anybody (just one strikeout) but I remember being enthralled by his use of five pitches (including a sweet knuckle curve) and his ability to change speeds and hit locations, resulting in a whole lot of weak swings by the fooled Sox.

Sometime in the next few days, my family went to a baseball card show when those were still around, and I snatched up every Mussina rookie card I could find, getting most for under a quarter. I was convinced I was going to be filthy rich in the future. Of course, baseball card values have tanked faster than oneseason.com, and he didn't quite turn into an all-time great, but still one hell of a pitcher.

This past season he won 20 games for the first time, and will become the first pitcher since Sandy Koufax to retire the season after winning 20. But don't let the just one 20 win season fool you, he was a victim of circumstance on many occasions. In 1994, he had 16 wins in 24 starts when the strike happened. Give him approximately 12 more starts, and it is very likely he would have won four of them. The following year, he finished with 19 wins, closing out the season with three straight complete games, two of them shutouts. In 1996, he again finished with 19 wins, after the bullpen blew leads in his final two starts. In addition, he won 18 games twice and 17 twice, and finishes out his career with 270 wins.

Hall of famer? Probably not. He was never considered the best pitcher in the league at any point in his career and never won a ring, despite being a pretty good postseason pitcher. If he had hung on and gotten to the 300 win mark, he would be a virtual lock, but it is not meant to be. Consider his consistency: At least 11 wins in all 17 full seasons of his career, and 9 top-six finishes in Cy Young voting. Perhaps most telling is the results of Bill James' four hall-of-fame tests. I won't go into a whole thing, but they are defined here. In three of the four tests, Mussina tests out as a likely Hall of Famer.

If he gets in, I am guessing it will be many, many years down the road, perhaps when the 300 win mark has become a complete thing of the past rather than merely a rarity. When the peaks of the careers of guys like Pedro and Randy Johnson aren't as fresh, and a more objective look at Mussina's career consistency can be had. He finishes up with 270 wins and an ERA of 3.68. There have been 23 eligible pitchers with 265 wins and an ERA under 3.69, and 20 of them are in the hall of fame. He ranks 33rd in career wins and 19th in career strikeouts. Expect a lengthy, entertaining, and probably ill-informed debate in five years.

If I had a vote, I'd put him in. Enjoy retirement and your precious crossword puzzles. Don't expect to see him doing much in the way of TV or professional coaching. If you want to read an excellent book chronicling his 2007 season (along with Tom Glavine's) with plenty of candid discussions from the pitchers, check out Living on the Black by John Feinstein, an excellent book and great look at two great pitchers at the end of their careers.

One More Night

I have one more night out here, and I'm stuck in another crappy hotel with no car, so I might as well have a couple and see if there are any other thoughts rattling around in my empty head.

- How crappy is this hotel you ask? They don't get ESPN or ESPN2 (but they do have ESPNNews) and the only beer they have in the gift shop is 7 oz bottles for $4 a piece. If I actually had to pay for that, I'd be pissed. At least they have a bar.

- So at some point I mentioned that I heard the newest possible future Twin was Kevin Kouzmanoff of the Padres. I can't remember where I heard it and I haven't heard it anywhere since, so it's probably a bunch of poop, but I wanted to bring it up because I was less than enthusiastic about the proposition, and I wanted to say I was wrong. I would love to have Kouzmanoff aboard. Upon further review, he's actually a very solid hitter who is having his best year, OPSing .756. No great shakes there, but compared to Lamb (.545), Punto (.823 but no way that keeps up), or Buscher (.782 - ditto) he'd be a welcome addition. As Sidler pointed out, he'd be a great platoon mate for Buscher. Obviously for a platoon type guy you don't want to give up much, and the word is the Padres want an outfielder. No way they trade Gomez, Span, or Young - nor should they - but what about Cuddyer or Kubel? There's been far too much "trade Cuddyer" talk, so that should never happen, but I can see them trading Kubel. I don't want them to, if anyone I'd rather see them ship off someone like Chris Parmelee. There are a lot of young outfielders in the Twins' system, so they could afford to lose a guy like Parmelee. Plus, the Kouz hates to walk and swings at far too many pitches, so he'd fit right in.

- I forgot to mention the man Jack Cust as a three true outcomes guy last night. He's a classic.

- By the way, next week is Shark Week on Discovery, the greatest week of the year. Although I have to say it's gotten weaker and weaker. In the past, they'd just have a whole bunch of kickass shark footage and interesting stories. Now they take their "hit shows" like mythbusters and dirty jobs and fit them into shark motifs. So weak. But yet, still awesome. Like the Star Wars prequels. Yeah, you know you liked them.

- So you know how Brett Favre is just like Pete Rose? Because of the the way they were both above average players who became legends because they compiled stats over their 200 year careers? Well how about this whole "tarnished legacy" thing they have going on? Rose because of the gambling, lying and bad haircut. Favre because of the pill popping, alcoholism, infecting his wife with cancer, and now jerking around the team and fans that worshipped him like Jesus wishes he was ever worshipped. Seriously, everyone should just keep him out of the hall of fame when he finally retires in 2020. After twelve more years of playing the drama queen.

- Why is worshipped showing up with a line under in to indicate a misspelling? Isn't that word? Is there only one p in there? Like, worshiped? Hmm. Apparently so. I'm not changing it. My way looks better.

- Christ, they don't get comedy central here either. Nice city. NYC can go to hell along with Brett Favre and Kevin McHale.

- Good to see Mike Mussina still dominates the Twins. As ESPN pointed out over and over again, he's 21-6 (now 22 I think it hasn't updated yet) against them career, most wins against any team other than the Blue Jays (24-12). He actually has better ERAs against quite a few other teams (they don't do WHIP in team by team splits) but doesn't he just seem to dominate the Twins everytime? I still think he's a serious hall-of-fame candidate. He has a shot at 300 wins, which is already rare and getting rarer, but I think people forget just how good he really was in his prime. He finished in the top 6 in Cy Young voting eight times. I know I've written about this before, but it's just really impressive. I've always been a HUGE Mussina fan, and even I didn't really realize how good he was. It will be interesting to see how this all ends up.

- Just saw a movie for the Star Wars: The Clone Wars animated movie. First of all, the fact that they aren't promoting the hell out of this thing tells me it's going to be a nice little stinker. Not to mention that it looks like a trailer for a video game. But if you'll indulge my inner nerd for a minute - well, a minute more - there's a line in the trailer where someone says, "Skywalker is the only hope for the republic" or some such. Well here's the problem. This movie is supposed to take place between movie II and III (maybe I and II but that's irrelevant here) and at this point Anakin is just a padawan or at best a rookie Jedi. There's still an entire army of Jedi going. It makes no sense. No sense at all I tells ya.

- Weird things are happening in the basketball world. First, Brandon Jennings leaves to go play in Europe for a year before entering the NBA draft. Not all that weird for him, since he's apparently too dumb to get into college, but it does set a precedent that I can see money grubbing whores following in the future. Then, today Josh Childress signes with a team in Greece. And this isn't like Lew Ford signing in Japan because that's the only team that would take him. This is a contract for like 6 mil a year. And he's not the first to leave the NBA for Europe (my main man Primoz Brezec did as well as a handful of other guys) but he's the first american to do it. $6 mil is a lot of money. If Europe starts handing out big contracts to mediocre NBA players, this whole thing is going to get very weird in a hurry. It's just bizarre. Petty soon Escalade and the Professor are going to in the NBA.

- At one point today I drove through a town in NJ that had a huge sign that said "Home of Fairleigh Dickinson." Kind of a weird thing to brag about. Although it's about sixty times more prestigious than UMD, so there's that.

- X files 2: The Most Anticipated Movie of 1998!!!!!

- Wiley Wiggins is a funny name.

- So what do we think about this Francisco Liriano dust up? He's like 9-0 with 200 strikeouts and -4 walks in his last something starts, but the Twins haven't called him back up yet and his agent is throwing a fit, accusing the Twins of keeping him down for monetary reasons. (Sidebar: Two years ago Bogart made more money than Liriano). I think this is just reason #126 why agents suck. Liriano sucked when he was up earlier this year. Sucked worse than Boof Bonser. Why rush it when they are playing as well as they are? Give it time Frankie, give it time.

- I have no idea what I just stumbled into, but there is a report about the Vampire Rights Amendment, which is apparently a group of people who are trying to pass laws to help the Vamps. Wat? In case you want to take this too seriously, the show also called the VRA "one of the most polarizing political issues affecting the nation." But seriously, there are people who are serious about this. Two quotes I've heard on this show: The dude asked the girl who was getting her blood sucked by a "vampire" if she was worried about becoming one and she said, "Uh...no. You don't become a vampire by getting your blood sucked, duh (note: she really said duh). Plus, I get to be with someone who has been around for 200 years pleasing women, and that's awesome." and then they asked some rednecks what they thought of the vampires and the dude said "They are an abomination about the bible" and was seriously angry. This is, without question, the weirdest thing I've ever seen, and it was on HBO. I still don't know if it was satire or not. Either way - hilarious.

- Sarah Chalke still hot.

- Does anyone else think this whole podcast thing has ruined the Sportsguy?

- the U of Texas is retiring Kevin Durant's number. I know he had one incredible season, but he had one incredible season. I don't get why they'd retire his number. Shouldn't that be saved for players who, you know, had an impact greater than five months?

- And that will do it