Archived Game Threads

Once upon a time, in the '80s, there was this athlete named Bo Jackson, no relation to Hugh, so far as i know (and i know pretty far*) And being a professional athlete in multiple sports, folk figured he must know something, and ran popular advertising to that effect. I was a wee tike then, so the advertising must have been a mixed success. I remember it existed, but not what was advertised. So to this day i am left wondering what or who does this pro Bo know? But enough with the history lesson. Which is sadly lacking in both history and lesson. The real choice for naming this thread Bo, is it starts the word Bomba. And only read th word, so forgive me for forgetting …

Top 10 rejected game thread intro ideas: 10. Pig latin. 9. Rip Van Winkle 8. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. 7. Thesis abstract. 6. Propaganda pamphlet. 5. Yoyo Tricks... by Yoyo Ma. 4. Ostrich: bury head in sand. 3. Things to complain about. 2. I spy with my little eye. and the number 1 rejected game thread into idea: 1. a David Letterman style top 10 list... Um... yeah... That didn't end well. Nevermind. Try again. And David said "thy servant shall fight these phillistwins" and Gardenhire outfitted him in a helmet and batting gloves. But David mistrusted it, and took just a ball and a glove out to the mound, glad that he was in the AL. Um... no. For on…

This is an early bird game thread intro, largely by necessity as i have something from noon to 2 and typically am foodening or driving up until game time. So today i promote the values of preparation. I am not entirely sure what they are, myself, so it is likely my means of doing so is by way of cautionary tale. I can't even post the line ups, it is so early. All i can say is Maeda and Bieber? Epic pitching match up. Hitters might not wish to fall behind. Swing early and often. Enjoy! Ps. Is it Duke of Earl, or Earl of Duke? Yes: Now keep those hits a-comin'! TWINS …

Yes i like pitching Pineda and that catch in the rain. as we're still watching baseball though our team's down the drain Then get up for this noon game and see how our team plays it might be quite the same as what this song says: White Socks: 0. Lance Lynn (R) P 1. Tim Anderson (R) SS 2. Gavin Sheets (L) 1B 3. Jose Abreu (R) DH 4. Brian Goodwin (L) RF 5. Adam Engel (R) CF 6. Leury Garcia (S) 2B 7. Jake Burger (R) 3B 8. Billy Hamilton (S) LF 9. Seby Zavala (R) C Twins: 0. Michael Pineda (R) P 1. Luis Arraez (L) 3B 2. Jorge Polanco (S) 2B …

In the spirit of "look, 4 white horses. and there are 4 of us", and with blatant apologies to Mr. Letterman, and the decade of the 90s, here are the top ten reasons for watching tonight's game (and perhaps complaining about it on a game thread) 10: Andrelton Simmons is playing short stop and batting 9: Willians Astudillo is playing first base and batting 8: Ryan Jeffers is catching and batting 7: Brent Rooker is playing left field and batting 6: Miguel Sano is hitting designatedly and batting 5: Josh Donaldson is playing 3rd base and batting 4: Rob Refsnyder is playing right field and batting 3: Jorge Polanco is playing 2nd base and…

Down 2-1 in the series, a win would earn us a split. And a theme that should be obvious for every get away game i could introduce: what can we get away with? And today i feel like trackin' down youtube references of musical nature to favorite, but lesser known movies: Six String Samurai: (and the band responsible for its soundtrack, the Red Elvises) El Mariachi: The Man in the White Suit: (you may doubt its musicality, but you'd be surprised how often you hear it sampled in other movies... most notably Bunsen and Honeydew's appearance in the Muppet Movie) and you can go watch any of 'em if your stomach isn't equal to the sight of Nick Gordan's majo…

Deja vu. I think i have been waiting for this parade before, tasked with writing a game thread, not knowing what i would write... But that (or those?) times the Twins weren't leading there division. I could away with substandard game intros. Ha. Jokes on them (you?) I got no standards to hold me down, to pick me up, to make me frown. So this is it. The fire trucks are shining their wheels, all in fine uniforms. Parade might be over by the time the game begins, and i got an opportunity to car pool, so i can post on the game thread... if my phone has charge and signal. They are handing out mucus (he means music...) percussionist asks if there is a triangle part, he …

Yeah, grief is supposed to be good... So i am told. Today, i felt it appropriate to honor Charles Schultz. I am sure he would approve Minnesota's baseball team and its stick-to-it-ive-ness in the face of welming odds (no just welming, we only wish they were over) I am too lazy to track down an iconic baseball image, or rather taking a small look, that the series ran almost half a centrmury, i am awed and humbled by the creativity inherent in such a run. Anyway, mad props go to.who ever can track down the image what best represents the Twins season so far. Even as kids we appreicated the strip, as i have vag…

A buddy o' mine is flying into the cities Monday, and thought to check out Target field which was a kindly sentiment, knowing he's not much of a sportsball fan. Last thing what got him to fenway was the Red Bull Crashed Ice competition. I looked at the schedule and saw there was no game. So i pointed him at the State Fair. I puttered round online, but in the short puttering i couldn't figure out how to pull headliners out from the more mundane every other hour shows. I read some of them allowed to various levels of ribald mockery, until i got to the lumberjack competitions. Now he has something to share with coworkers. But that being said, i's happy to pass on any r…

To get back into the post season this year, a broom or two just won't cut it. We need an industrial strength wetdry shop vac, as well as help across the board from many other teams. The Miracle Braves had more than half a season to make their comeback. We got only a month. But that's no excuse to lose faith... The Rockies did something like that in the late aughts. It isn't impossible. It just needs probability such as is only seen at the start of Tom Stoppard plays: And my humble apologies for the short intro last time i wrote one. I lost track of time while helping a friend move, and he told me to pull off to the side of the road and put it up. This woul…

I think i got the honor of introducing the game thread... 2 years ago? And so i've probably worked out a well travelled groove of Star Wars jokes already. You all are welcome to make them, i'm going to devote this here intro space to pontificate upon the acknowledged inspiratoin for Star Wars: The Hidden Fortress. I highly recommend you watch it if you're into that sort of thing. Indeed, pretty much any Akira Kurosawa movie is worth seeing at least once (with subtitles as needed) If i had to (and that's the corner i'm painting myself into) summarize a baseball related theme of the movie, it's... Free Agency (with nod to player development) it has epic showdowns. Our R…

Deep Thought: buy Jack Handey I am not Jack Handey, last i checked. so it's okay if i am shallow. Deep Thought: Deep Thought. How would it manage calling balls and/or strikes? Would Sano have struck out so frequently? And am i talking about the IBM product, or the Douglas Adams figment? Deep Thought: Cubs They are hosting this game. I wonder if they thought of offering Hostess Cub Cakes. They might not go over so well if cub is a listed ingredient. Deep Thought: Twins. We have a similar record as the Cubs. It is hard to tell us apart. Could this series decide our draft pick order next draft pick? Maybe no one will…

Pull up a lawn chair, pour yerself a ice tea or limeade, and enjoy the game! Twins Michael Pineda (R ) 1. Max Kepler (L) CF 2. Jorge Polanco (S) SS 3. Nelson Cruz (R ) DH 4. Eddie Rosario (L) LF 5. C.J. Cron (R ) 1B 6. Luis Arraez (L) 2B 7. Miguel Sano ( R) 3B 8. Jason Castro (L) C 9. Jake Cave (L) RF Royals Homer Bailey ( R) 1. W. Merrifield ( R) RF 2. Nicky Lopez (L) 2B 3. Alex Gordon (L) LF 4. Hunter Dozier (R ) 3B 5. Jorge Soler (R ) DH 6. C. Cuthbert ( R) 1B 7. H. Arteaga ( R) SS 8. M. Maldonado (R ) C 9. Billy Hamilton (S) CF Apologies for a degenerate intro, but i didn't plan as well as i shoulda, and a friend is waiting for me in Madison.

And the amazing technicolor game thread intro... Joe M conversation: Morgan: Why are there so many strangers here? Madden: September call ups. Give a lot of folk a cup of coffee and a chance to show their stuff in the big show. Mientkiewicz: Not all of us are even Joes. I shouldn't even be here. I got a minor league team to manage. Morgan: Don't we have something special today? Montana: Yeah, the annual I Spy championships. I have been training since May! Go ahead, try me! McCarthy: Alright. I spy with my little eye... something beginning with S. Montana: Sand. McCarthy: Got it one! Try this... I spy with my little eye something beginning with D Monta…

Baseball: The final frontier. Our 6 month mission to visit strange new ballparks, seek out new plates and new pitches to launch over fences, and to boldly catch what no one has caught before. Coaches log: Stardate* some Saturday out Sirius way. We are in skirmishes along the Ranger neutral zone. We have suffered heavy casualties, with Chief Bomba Office Cruz and Raincatcher Buxton amongst the sickbay residents. It has been a constant trial keeping the crew to their stations, maintaining moral while training replacements on the fly, while not mixing metaphors outside of the genre. But amid this adversity, we persevere. And things are not as bad as all that. Today,…

But sampleSize, how can a game thread have 2 names? Um... They are Twins of course... (But note: it is still only one thread... I have some sense of how far i should take a joke. Not many, but i do have my moments...) Winning. It is new territory. A place we have visited in the past, but weren't sure we could live there. So to help folk get used to the idea, i figured would reminisce somewhat. Good ol' Tom Jefferson had just got himself his version of Nelson Cruz called Louisiana. And wanted to know what he got so he sent Lewis & Carole with their guides Sacajawea and Susan B. Anthony off to hunt the Snark in the new territory. It was a long time ago, but …

I don’t see a game thread for tonight, but whoever is doing the thread, I feel like this photo of Alex Cora during last night’s game needs to be included:

5 things to think about... 1. I got a friend who closed on a house earlier this week. So please forgive me if i have a one track mind. 2. Final regular season Twins home game. I hope we win. 3. Scoring runs by getting home. Sorry! That was too easy. 4. High Culture. See game thread title. 5. Pop culture, an incomplete list: "Slimey? Mudhole? My home this is!" Strong are we with the force, but are we yet Jedi? Kansas City 0. Jorge Lopez (R ) P 1. W. Merrifield (R ) LF 2. A. Mondesi ( S ) SS 3. Jorge Soler (R ) DH 4. Hunter Dozier (R ) 3B 5. Ryan McBroom (R ) RF 6. C. Cuthbert (R ) 1B 7. Bubba Starling (R ) CF 8. H. Arteaga (R ) 2B 9. Nick Dini (R ) C Minn…

All rise! The right honourable Umpire is entering the stadium (do the get walk up music? if not, what should they have?) On the charge of waiting until the last second to write a game thread intro, how do you plead? Squirrel! Let the Jury take note that the defendent won't give a straight answer. Wait... who is in this jury you're talking about? Why, the contributors to this thread, naturally. Oh, for a moment you were making light of the injured twins, as being "in jury"... Hardly. That's how you see the world. Let the record show that the defendent thinks that Movie Quotes make a good game thread intro. Just settin' a good example: others s…

The dog ate my game thread intro. I was stuck in traffic. One more donut won't hurt me. What are some other poor excuses? Go on, you can come up with better! Kansas City 0. Eric Skoglund ( L) P 1. W. Merrifield (R ) RF 2. A. Mondesi ( S ) SS 3. Jorge Soler (Rb) DH 4. Hunter Dozier (R ) 3B 5. Alex Gordon ( L) LF 6. Ryan McBroom (R ) 1B 7. Erick Mejia ( S ) CF 8. Nicky Lopez ( L) 2B 9. Nick Dini (R ) C Minnesota: 0. Randy Dobnak (R ) P 1. Mitch Garver (R ) C 2. Jorge Polanco ( S ) SS 3. Nelson Cruz (R ) DH 4. Eddie Rosario ( L) LF 5. Miguel Sano (R ) 3B 6. M. Gonzalez ( S ) RF 7. C.J. Cron (R ) 1B 8. J. Schoop (R ) 2B 9. Ryan LaMarre (R ) CF Well, my other gam…

"And he stoppeth one of three..." I'll take one for the team. This is the one we listen to what the ancient mariners really have to say. Personally i hope we get the spruce goose, rather than an albatross. I also hope we win, and not because the rest of the leauge dies off. Things to think about... Coleridge: I had this wonderful dream* where it was the 80s, Reagan was preisdent, and there was an epic game thread intro that i read. Then i woke up and started writing it down, and well something distracted me, and when i got back to writing it, i had forgotten most of it. So i had to make up the rest, so it won't be any different than the rest of mine. In Minnesot'…

Complete the following sentence: "Revenge is a Dish best served ____" They knocked us out of the playoffs last year. True, it was crazy time season only 60 games long and extra special post season, but shouldn't that just make it easier to do something different than we normally do? Well, they have come all the way up i35*, the least we can do is show them some proper hospitality! Take a peek at the line ups. See anything in the following to pique your interest? Peak specimens, all! Astros: 0. Jose Urquidy (R) P 1. Jose Altuve (R) 2B 2. M. Brantley (L) LF 3. Alex Bregman (R) 3B 4. Yordan …

Gee whiz, i was having such a wonderful dream, how Colume saved a game against his old team, and we made up a coveted game against our heated rivals. then i looked at a box score and saw how many more we needed to make up. How soon do they start publishing magic numbers? Just let me revel in my team's success one more game, until they have left for Iowa... Wait, there isn't a MLB team in Iowa?! What gives? Oh, right, they were going on last night about the field of dreams game, and how it would be if Kevin Costner rotated his crops and players had to disappear into beets. Obviously beets would be where football players go. Don't they know an…

"The Odyssey 2*" Opening scene: Old man (played by Nelson Cruz) with an oar on his shoulder shuffling down the road. Twins fan catches his forelorn eye, waves and says, "is that a fan on your shoulder, or are you just happy to see me?" and an expressionof great relief crosses the oldman's face... Summary (i am too lazy and the game approaches) Odysseus (Cruz) is on the run from the law due to slaughtering all his wife's suitors, has to take care of hia family in hiding and still make good on his promice to expand poseidon's realm, whne he hears some of his band survived their travels butare caught by crazy dangers. Join us as Cruz teach…

In a hole in the ground there lived... a Gopher. (Well, this is Minnesota we're talking about) It was neither filled with great green gobs of... nor was it a dry sandy hole where TC the bear might be hibernating. It was gopher hole with no gopher, which can only mean one thing: some one hit a gopher ball! (cue the 2019 Twins promo... oh right... i'm trying to parody great literature, and they didn't do multi media back then) So much for trying to play off shorter attention spans... Which is my way of saying i'm lazy. And all that by way of saying give the young ones a chance to find their feet. I'd like to have made it to the scene where Rocco answers a bunch of doubtin…

The "Waiting for Gobot" Game Thread covering the Twins vs As 3:05pm cdt 5/15/2021 ad (by Bectimus Sam) Setting: A suburban front lawn, a lone tree still waking up from the winter. In the background, neighbor is having a yard sale with the usual garage cruft: tattered clothes, old semi-functional tools, a dubious looking bike or two, fishing poles, tackle boxes, you know the like. Only thing eye catching is a bin of "vintage" 80's toys, dolls ("action" figures) and such. An ol' fart comes out and hangs a placard on the tree reading: 3:05pm Oakland 0. Cole Irvin ( L) P 1. Mark Canha (R ) LF 2. Seth Brown ( L) DH 3. Ramon Laureano (R…

Welcome to the "Worst Game Thread Intro Ever", a game thread where nothing is ordinary, and everything is superlative. Nuance? what is that? (But sampleSize, why worst, rather than best? Surely you should write good things? Well, Rhetorical Question, that would be selfish) I confess, I didn't like to see Andrew Albers go down. Sure, he had a little trouble last outing. But at least i have the next best thing. I get to write in favor of another working man's pitcher: Randy Dobnak. But i go to cut and paste the line up, lo and behold, his name is no longer there, and Albers is back up. I am torn... Did my secret desire jinx Mr. Dobnak? Is it my fault he has this set ba…

Today is a special day. Not only do our Twins host the Royals on their push for a post season berth, but today is the first day of Oktoberfest. Now you may note that it's not yet October. There is an important distinction. Oktoberfest is the harvest festival held in Munich Germany. It's the largest beer festival in the world. On the east side of the Saint Croix River, we have a great German Heritage. Fantastic German restaurants, festivals, and of course, a hearty few of us Twins Fans! So next time you feel that urge to tease me about my great state, just remember, Wisconsin is as close to a German experience as you can get to from Minnesota without catching as flight…

Whew. What a week. There was so much Twins news, our heads are spinning. There was good news. There was bad news. There were bombas. There were games (ok, game) without bombas. There were opposite field singles. There were lots of opposing team singles. It kind of reminds me of that classic children’s book by Remy Charlip, “Fortunately”: Fortunately, my friend lent me an airplane. Unfortunately, the motor exploded. Fortunately, there was a parachute. Unfortunately, there was a hole in the parachute. Fortunately, I landed on a haystack. Unfortunately, there was a pitchfork on the haystack. In honor of that timeless book and the head spinning Twins goings on, tod…

I’ve been kind of hanging in the lowlights for the past month. A lot of stress-induced games by the Twins have led me to stay away from the online keyboards so I don’t say anything I regret. However, I do have a few questions to start off this series finale. Why do teams have elephants as mascots, but not as the actual name of the team? (Looking at you, Oakland and Alabama) Is it bad that I’ve never heard of half of the pitchers on Oakland’s roster? (Blake Treinen and (gulp) Liam Hendriks are exceptions) Are there actually going to be five good teams in the National League this year? What a disaster! Why was the last game thread named after my dog?