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Instead of writing an original piece of HIGH STRANGENESS to satisfy your curiosity, I am sharing a most EDIFYING piece in praise of the one solitary run the Twins are allowed to score in most games. 4 out of 6 since last we talked. Gather, ye ball fans As I make all clear The most mirthful joy Of our ONE run cheer! To score runs PLURAL Cannot be much fun Compared to sheer glee From scoring just one! Teams - not the Twins, no They love the long ball They hammer and drive They score, one and all! Bless’d fans of TC How lucky are we? To score just a run And not two or three? That one run, and how! When we see it plate, To bed we can go Needn’t stay up late. Our run! It’s our run! It’s the only we get! You must love the run! When your teams plays not so very good. ⁃ The Bard Axel Kohagen

Gather round the fire, ye baseball fans. Imagine, if you will, a roaring blaze licking from beneath a tent of shattered bat handles. Listen to the tale I am about to tell, for EVERY word is true. I tell the tale . . . Of the BASEBALL WEREWOLF! A baseball werewolf behaves in much the same way as your regular, meat and potatoes werewolf. The moon and the night bring out its power, which is the ONLY possible explanation for why the Twins seem able to score ONLY AFTER THE FIFTH INNING in the last week of so. How did the power of lycanthropy find our hometown nine? In older times, a person might become a werewolf by donning the fur coat of an evil person or spirit. Unless Bill Belichick left his Ewok-hide duster around after the Super Bowl, this theory seems DEAD ON ARRIVAL. It’s likely a careful fan might notice a Twins player taking the field while wearing a fur coat. Kent Hrbek playing in a werewolf-fur coat is both likely to happen and a guarantee he will be the league MVP. Another theory suggests a person can become a werewolf by drinking rain gathered in the footprint of a wolf, so if anyone recently spotted Logan Morrison carrying a LONG STRAW and heading to the zoo’s Minnesota Trail, PLEASE inform this columnist post-haste. Most likely, a member of the Twins was bitten by a grizzled European character actor. After all, when’s the last time you’ve seen the Twins playing with their SILVER slugger awards? As long as they keep winning, THIS COLUMNIST will howl at the moonshots for the home team! Even if they don’t score runs until his old buttocks are already abed and asleep! Now comb your hair and let’s all head to Trader Vic’s! ⁃ Axel Kohagen of London (For more serious lunacy, head to www.supertruestories.com and check out my podcast!)

Joe Mauer’s DEVOTION regarding walking up to T.I.’s “What You Know?” is well-known and even generates some GOOD-NATURED RIBBING from the chaps who write baseball things. Yet, has the STABLE SLUGGER hidden a message of PROFOUND SUPERNATURAL LORE within these words? Consider the following lyrics: What you know about that? What you know about that? What you know about that? Simple, upon first view. But simplicity can hide behind its cloaks GREAT COMPLEXITY, like the bounteous spread of dishes at your local PIZZA RANCH! If you look closely, you will see each line of this selection contains both FIVE WORDS and SIX SYLLABLES! The odds of this happening by chance are ASTRONOMICAL! The odds off this happening for just two lines is rare enough we scream the magical word “JINX!” to ease our sense of interdimensional HORROR! THE DARK GODS THEN DEMAND A COKE! The word “know,” the middle word of five, hints at a world we may imagine but will likely never visit. Is this the QUIET PLACE where the Mighty Mauer’s patience at the plate was born? Is he teasing us because we can never reach this zen ballpark? WE MUST GO DEEPER! Six of the fifteen words end with “at.” Is “that” where it’s “at?” The remaining two words, “you” and “about,” cannot be ignored. “About” has two syllabouts, whereas “you” only has what. That adds up you what hell about a know take on this old song. You know what? About that. What, that? You know about! That about know you what. You know about, What That

(Note - it is my hope that we are far enough past the CIRCLE ME BERT CANCELLATION NIGHTMARE that I may impart some TRUTHFUL TRUTHS. If my voice is silenced suddenly, please leave a stick figure drawing of TC Bear in a City Pages on the big glove sculpture. My people will understand.) Roswell, NM. An alien spacecraft crashes in the desert. The cover-up begins immediately. Some say it was a WEATHER BALLOON or an EXPERIMENTAL AIRCRAFT. A few even think the whole incident was an ELABORATE DECEPTION from the mind of BILL VEECK! From the wreckage, a small, spherical object rolled free. Some say that object was a baseball. It moved quickly and avoided detection for around TEN YEARS. A small boy reached out to touch it. Within moments, his arm began to GLOW. Years later, the boy became a man named BB. His otherworldly curveball made him a LEGEND. When B transitioned to announcing, he wanted to make contact with the aliens whose ENERGIES he encountered as a small boy. In a meeting with his PRODUCTION STAFF and CERTAIN AQUATIC FISHMEN WHO MAINTAIN AN INTEREST IN EARTHEN TECHNOLOGIES, B created a program to place a symbol of the UFO WHO BROUGHT HIS POWERS on the broadcast. The UFO from underneath. THE CIRCLE OF BERT! Why was this NEARLY CANCELLED? There are things I simply CANNOT REVEAL, but an occasional visitor to the stadium has his own relationship to the UFOs, and he has some pretty BIGFEET. There's not much else I can reveal, except that I have it on GOOD AUTHORITY the aquatic fishmen are not happy with the last ten years or so of Mariners Baseball. The Truth Is Not Here, -- Axel Kohagen

Once, many of us still believed in a magical NORTH POLE where SANTA CLAUS makes everything all better (perhaps more of you would still believe if it wasn't for a terrible lie your parents told you to benefit BIG ELFING). Sadly, childhood may be the last time the lot of us all believed in a magical place ON EARTH! We Iowans once tried to pull some flim-flammary to convince you Iowa was heaven, FOOLED YOU, MINNESOTA! Some people still find it in themselves to believe in heaven on the planet. Every day they go to work - JUST LIKE YOU - but inside they harbor daydreams about SHANGRI-LA or EL DORADO or SCOOTER THOMPSON'S ELEPHANT EAR HUT. Lots of people believe in the lost city of Atlantis, but remain much LESS ENTHUSIASTIC about the MISPLACED TOWNSHIP OF WOOOO-PACKERS, WISCONSIN. However, on this day while the Twins have actually won a game, does anyone still believe in the MAGICAL LAND OF THE MINNESOTA TWINS WORLD CHAMPIONS? If so, how have you held on through the DARK NIGHTS OF SUFFERING? I write "nights" quite purposefully, for it seems this band of baseball brothers really enjoys clenching it all up so they can POO the BED in the later innings. Does your loss of faith come tied to a blown lead or another damn strike-out? Do you remember the name "DAVID HALE" and wonder who he was, or where he went to, or whether or not any of this matters because we are all dust in the wind? Or are you a little OUT THERE like me? Is your heart dialed in to that RAINBOW CONNECTION that has Minnie and Paul shaking hands over the WORLD SERIES TROPHY, being held by a giant JOE MAUER bobblehead? Do you cheer for the Twins when it ain't over, it's just HIGHLY MATHEMATICALLY IMPROBABLE? It's a bit DARING to share UNBRIDLED HOPE when your team's playing like TEN TONS OF BUTT in a 5 POUND BAG that was not EXPLICITLY CREATED FOR THE TRANSPORT OF BUTT AND BUTT RELATED PRODUCTS. But summer's always better when you can believe. And Atlantis? Great location for catching walleye. -- Get me a banjo and lillypad, Axel Kohagen (For more wisdom, check out my podcast at http://www.supertruestories.com/)

Why can't Target Field have a yeti? Even a dedicated master of the art of SUPERNATURAL BASEBALL has trouble cobbling together enough words to delve into the spirit of this wonderful sport. It's difficult enough to put on a face to open your door in these days of late, late winter. No baseball cap upon your head but instead a STOCKING CAP where the pom pom is made of the SHREDDED PLANS OF YOUR SNOWBOUND LIFE! Twins fans spent a whole weekend indoors without a BIT of baseball to ease the pain. Many of us had to spend time speaking to our ACTUAL FAMILIES! It would be a nice gesture if the Twins released a LIVE YETI onto the unshoveled parts of America's National Winter Wasteland. This is not as difficult as you might initially think. After all, a Twins advertiser regularly brings a live Bigfoot to baseball games. I have it on good authority this is a SUBURBAN SASQUATCH who can't be bothered to menace a camper if that camper had their missing S'mores ingredients. A yeti, though. That's a different thing than a sasquatch. Yeti's tend to have white fur and they think it's stupid to say "Duck, Duck, Grey Duck." They might not enjoy life in the Cities, but they make WONDERFUL snow forts and get REAL cross when, say, TC Bear smashes into them with a snowmobile. You notice TC Bear doesn't snowmobile around as much anymore? Do you think he misses it? I mean, if he did, who would he tell? Ron Gardenhire's with Detroit now. Anyway, tuning in to see a yeti frolic in Target Field might seem bizarre, but it would be A GREAT DEAL BETTER than spending a weekend with a BUTTLOAD of snow and an earful of people complaining about it. You don't have to be an expert in SUPERNATURAL BASEBALL to know baseball IS magic. Give us the magic, then take it away, and there's going to be sadness. So is a baseball yeti so much to ask? Aspiring Skunk Ape, Axel Kohagen

Imagine the Universe, swirling mysteriously across untold aeons and dimensions. Within this maelstrom, how can one isolate the force that is Mauer Power? How far does it extend? Is it more polite than other Universal forces, like Hulkamania? My goals may be lofty in this Universe, and yet I am COMPELLED to write yet another column about Mauer and the home runs. This Question of the Ages is a perennial classic for the local sports media. For most of them, it seems Mauer Power did not increase the size of their hearts three sizes in all. So I stand at the precipice that is beginning this column, armed with the knowledge that only a FULL and MEASURED knowledge of THE UNSEEN WORLD can solve this riddle. And it’s all done with numbers. In 2009, Joe Mauer hit the most home runs for season he'd ever hit in his career. He has yet to meet or exceed that number again - the number 28. Mauer's number is 7. 7 is widely considered to be a lucky and powerful number. 28 divided by 7 is 4. 28 also ends in 8, whereas 2009 ends in 9. These are not the same numbers. However, 7 did eat 9, which is highly symbolic of Mauer's power in the year 2009. This year is 2018. 18 is equal to 9 times 2. Skid Row taught us that 18 equals Life, which is also promising. This mathematics teaches me that Joe Mauer will hit 56 home runs in 2018, because of the maths mentioned above. And yet, this SIMPLICITY of the UNIVERSE seems complicated or even ridiculous to those not attuned to the POWERS OF MYSTERIOUS POWERS. And if he could just line drive those suckers into the left field stands like a screaming banshee. the Universe would crap itself in delight. Magically Delicious, Axel

Some folks will tell you there's a special kind of magic to Opening Day. But ask a stathead to identify exactly what type of magic we're dealing with and the room goes quiet. Is it simply the crack of the bat, the taste of the hot dog, and the lack of parkas? Surely this magic is there, but there are levels of mysteries in this world. Some of these mysteries can disturb the very foundations of reality, yet when handled with a cool, level hand (such as mine), a baseball fan can learn of NEW WORLDS and contemplate STRANGE MYSTERIES, like the much-whispered about Interplanetary Coalition to Destroy "Circle Me Bert," or ICDCMB. Today, I have come to teach you about THE MANDELA EFFECT! This phenomenon is named after a series of odd occurrences where people believed Nelson Mandela died well before he actually did. Could this be a simple case of coincidental misrememberings spread across the internet? Perhaps. OR PERHAPS IT IS A SIGN THESE INDIVIDUALS PEERED INTO A DIFFERENT DIMENSION, ONE WHERE MANDELA DID DIE EARLIER! There's also a lot said about the correct spelling of the Bering Sea Bears books. But how does this relate to baseball, you ask? This "Mandela Effect" affected me in regards to Opening Day! Somehow, perhaps as I slumbered, I envisioned another dimension where THE MINNESOTA TWINS played their first game on TUESDAY, not THURSDAY! So clear was this vision that I even dressed in a cap and t-shirt to support the home team. I even prepped a meal of HOT DOGS to add to the celebration. Yet, when I turned my attention to the Internet, I discovered the vision was WRONG! My family and I ate a silent meal containing THE HOT DOGS OF SHAME! Doubtful? Doubt no longer! Just one day later my will was brought into ANOTHER OTHER DIMENSION where I believed the TWINS OPENED THE SEASON AT HOME! I nearly logged onto a ticket-selling website to purchase a ticket before I became aware of my natural dimension. As a father of a toddler, these experiences HAVE to be related to the Mandela Effect and cannot have any connection to general confusion and exhaustion. Also, I am old. Why this should happen two times in a short period of time I cannot say. It seems odd the universe would be so disturbed. After all, it seems there is a surplus of kindness and camaraderie these days. I believe the true magic of Opening Day kept me from getting lost in these alternate timelines. After all, baseball is a magical thing that can bring a group of people together to be happy, except in regards to the umpires and the New York Yankees. -- Axel Kohagen Your Paranormal Baseball Reporter