Jack Graney (1886)
Garland Braxton (1900)
Danny McFayden (1905)
Vic Harris (1905)
Mike Kreevich (1908)
Frank Demaree (1910) Chuck Thompson (1921) Hank Foiles (1929)
Carmen Cozza (1930) Ed Palmquist (1933) Kazuhisa Inao (1937)
Johnny Edwards (1938)
Ken Singleton (1947)
Elias Sosa (1950)
Gerry Hunsicker (1950)
Francisco Barrios (1953) Scott Ullger (1955) Floyd Bannister (1955)
Pokey Reese (1973)
Freddy Garcia (1975)
Outfielder Carmen Cozza played in the low minors in 1952-1953, batting .242. He later became a college football coach, most notably at Yale. Upon his retirement in 1996, he held the record for most coaching victories in the Ivy League (179) and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 2002.
This is also the birthday of Twins’ farmhand Jairo Perez (1988).
The Twins are 8-2 in their last ten games, which is the best in the majors. Plus, they're only a game and a half behind the Royals. Time to beat up on some more NL teams and move firmly into "mediocre".
Dude Esterbrook (1857)
Irish Meusel (1893)
Mike Ryba (1903)
Frank McCormick (1911)
Jimmy Newberry (1922)
Roy Smalley (1926)
Bill Virdon (1931)
Howie Gershberg (1936) Jake Jacobs (1937) Julio Gotay (1939) Bruce Look (1943) Tom Egan (1946)
Dave Parker (1951) Tom Edens (1961) Randy Winn (1974)
We would also like to wish a happy birthday to SBG’s uncle and to his brother.
Denard Span could feel his brain swimming laps between his ears.
This whole game has been one big blur, people rising up out of the dizzying maelstrom of colors and sounds shouting that we were "coming back!". How many times do we have to come back in this one? It seemed like they had come back 3 or 4 times already, let's see there was the Doumit homer (ed. note - to give the Twins a 6-5 lead), the Plouffe homer (ed. note - to tie the game at 2), the time Babe the Blue Ox ran over the Cubs catcher while Jim Thome dressed as Paul Bunyan applauded from the third base coaches box (ed. note - ????), the time Mastrioanni hit a triple - wait, Mastrioanni hit a triple? this flu is seriously messing with my head (ed. note - Mastrioanni did indeed hit a triple, it scored Dozier and tied the game at 5), and now Morneau had tripled to score Willingham and Gardy is shouting something at me.
Liddle is next to me now. Suddenly I'm on the field. Third base, I think. Yes. I focus all my energy on the bright yellow dragon standing in the batters box (ed. note - Casilla, probably). I hear the crack of the bat and I just start running. It's only after I get back to the dugout that Joe explains to me that I was out by about 20 feet and looked kind of like a fool. Honestly, at this point I'm more focused on not passing out than whether the game is over or not.
Because of that focus it took me a while to realize that I might have to bat. I'm conscious enough to realize this is probably a bad idea as the pitcher's mound currently appears to be occupied by a particularly malevolent shade of purple to my eyes. Josh Willingham looks at me in the on-deck circle and asks if I'm feeling OK. I try to reassure him, but given his look of concern, I'm guessing I ended up speaking in tongues again. I hear him mutter "I had better just take care of this myself." As he walks up to the plate.
"What about Ha Ha Tonka?"
"Yes."
"Lydia Loveless?"
"Yes."
"Scott. H. Biram?"
"Yes."
"Bobby Bare Jr. or the Bottle Rockets?"
"Dad! Those all come from the same label!"
"Yeah, right Lisa. A wonderful, magical label."
That's how I feel some days. Whenever Bloodshot announces a new artist on their label, I figure there's a 50/50 chance they're soon gonna be my new favorite band.