115 thoughts on “August 30, 2013: Oh Danny Boy…”

  2. Kubel traded to the Indians. Did I ever tell you I went to law school with his sister?

    Spoiler SelectShow

  5. Went to the Gophers game last night and had pretty decent seats: 7th row at the 10 yard line. Here are some observations after 1 game:

    Probably one of the closer 4 touchdown wins you'll ever see as Gophers score 2 late TDs in garbage time so this may be more negative than it needs to be.

    Passing game needs work. Nelson always went to his first option or ran the ball. Receivers didn't get open at all. Running game wasn't great, but the team admitted they had a "vanilla package" and will do more as the season progresses.

    Defense o.k. except for a few glaring mistakes. UNLV mostly did a little 5 yard pass attack, I wish the Gophers would have responded better to that. Hageman is a beast! Tackling was decent, which was a switch from previous years.

    Special Teams obviously shone with block kicks, returns for TDs etc. Oh and only one 5 yard penalty! that's a huge improvement over previous years.

    Basically Gophers did what they needed to do against a lessor team. Hopefully they can use the cream puff part of their schedule to get better because B1G teams will be bigger, stronger, faster. I'd need to see more before I predict more than 2 conference wins.

    Finally, now in its 5th season, TCF Bank stadium is still gorgeous. It's held up well and is a great place to watch a game. The students were really providing a lot of energy. After the sun went down it was actually a glorious night to watch a football game (I pitied those suckers watching 3rd-rate professional football indoors 2 miles away). I got my ticket for $20 on the street and I would encourage anyone with a passing interest in the Gophers to see a game, especially on a nice Fall afternoon. If you need someone to go with you, I'd could be easily convinced to go, I can even get free parking.

    1. We were there too but were only able to stay until midway through the 1st quarter. We brought kernel to it as her first sporting event and she had a blast (tailgating, rouser, national anthem with sky-divers!!!, clapping and shaking her booty) until she was too tired stand up straight - then we headed out.

      I'll emphatically concur with free's last point and add that the ushers and elevator operators were great. Due to the heat, they let people bring water/bottles in and even let us bring our umbrella stroller to the seats (online says you have to check 'em with guest services - yuck).

      I followed the game on the radio for most of the evening. I think the rest of his analysis is spot on; was especially annoyed with the pass defense. But, a win's a win.

      1. the defense was somewhat inconsistent. UNLV clearly got discouraged in the 2nd half and stopped executing offensively. But the Gophers' offensive line had better improve significantly in the next few weeks if they are going to run the ball at all. Not much push.

        When you score on a 98-yard kickoff return, 78-yard blocked kick return, and 89-yard INT return, your score looks more impressive than it probably deserves. Nelson had a nice, long run for a TD in the first half, and he did a nice job of finishing off that drive at the end of the half. But as a team, they didn't show much beyond the fact that they can beat up on a team that has lost 23 straight road games.

      2. Forgot to mention that we ran into Flip in the tailgate lot. He was walking around with two pretty cheerleader/spirit squad types. Thought to myself, "Must be rough".

        He came by a few minutes later by himself with a Coors Light in hand. When asked what he was up to, he said, "I'm looking for my daughter, have you seen her?" and goes on to describe one of the pretty cheerleader/spirit squad types. We pointed him in the right direction and off he went through the crowd.

        It seemed sort of neat that he was so cool/nonchalant about it. I guess I've always assumed that the higher-ups in professional sports would be jerks or pompous a$$holes but I've never actually met one in person. Not to say that this proves it one way or the other, but it did change my perception a bit.

        Also, he's really short.

          1. Or, more likely, Flip has been drinking Coors since college and just doesn't feel comfortable with anything else.

          2. Maybe he's just being practical. No point go nuts on Left Hand Stout or anything nice when all you need is something cold at a tailgate.

            1. I think it was this - I didn't purchase it, but I was drinking Leinie's Original and it did the trick. I doubt he purchased that Coors either.

              1. I doubt he purchased that Coors either.

                So, he's reduced to begging folks for drain pour. My original point stands.

    2. A certain club I follow from time to time is opening up their season tonight on national television. Okay, it's Fox Sports 1, but still. They'll be underdogs, but a win tonight would be something.

        1. The faithful are revved up. If you think that they aren't thinking win tonight, you're wrong. At K-State. They expect to win.

          I'm not exactly thinking that, but I am thinking that they'll show well. The big deal is to get out of the game with minimal injuries.

    3. Ive been to 1 game at TCF, and that was a couple of years ago. I had a great time and have been thinking about going again but things have no lined up right.

      The thing most surprising to me is that the place gets LOUD, even if its 2/3rds full (as it was at the game I attended)

      1. Since I'm assuming I'll never have the money or opportunity to go to a game at Lambeau, I think I'd maybe like to try to go to a Packers/Vikings game at TCF when they're playing there.

  6. I see that the Twins are within shouting distance of the third overall pick. #getitdonebillysmith

      1. grampaS complains about my current community (50,000) being too big for him. which raises questions for me as to how he thinks he and my mom are going to transition (eventually) to a retirement community or assisted living in the Twin Cities.

  8. Yahoo encouraged me to read a "team report".

    Morneau's bat, on the other hand, has put his name back in the trade waiver conversation. The Twins shopped him around before the July 31 trade deadline but there were no takers due to a bad slump.

    But almost immediately following expiration of the trade deadline, Morneau snapped out of the slump hit the ball for power during most of August. Now rumors persist that the Pirates are still interested in obtaining Morneau.

    Presented without further commentary, Morneau's slash line for the last 28 days: 235/284/490

  9. Last night, presumably because there wasn't much baseball to choose from, Rob Neyer tweeted his desire for a channel devoted to minor league baseball, which gave me an idea for a supplemental MLB.tv feature: daily historic games. MLB could select one or two of the best or most interesting games played on that date, and provide them for streaming. Doesn't necessarily have to be limited to televised games, either – I'd love tuning in to a radio feed from the Fifties or earlier. If MLB wants to run with this idea, they can hire me to select the games.

    1. I love the idea. When the network was first starting, there was a thread on BTF about programming. I suggested there that they should open up their vault and show random games from the past. I suggested not just showing "classic games" from the postseason, but games featuring players we would have wanted to see. The one specific player I mentioned was Mark Fidrych. Sure enough, by March they had reaired a Mark Fidrych game in its entirety (and I DVR'd it and it was awesome). Anyway, be careful, they just may appropriate your idea!

      1. I'd love it if they took the idea and ran with it. Since I first thought of it, I've been creating a mental list of games I'd love to see. Teufel's walk-off inside-the-park three-run homer in 1984 is high on the list.

      2. I wouldn't mind seeing or listening to games from the DiMaggio Yankees, or even the Mickey Mantle Yankees.

  10. More snobbish wordsmithing from Bryan Garner this morning:

    "that and which"

    You'll encounter two schools of thought on this point. First are those who don't care about any distinction between these words, who think that "which" is more formal than "that," and who point to many historical examples of copious "whiches." They say that modern usage is a muddle. Second are those who insist that both words have useful functions that ought to be separated, and who observe the distinction rigorously in their own writing. They view departures from this distinction as "mistakes."

    Before reading any further, you ought to know something more about these two groups: those in the first probably don't write very well; those in the second just might.

    So assuming you want to learn the stylistic distinction, what's the rule? The simplest statement of it is this: if you see a "which" without a comma (or preposition) before it, nine times out of ten it needs to be a "that." The one other time, it needs a comma. Your choice, then, is between comma-"which" and "that." Use "that" whenever you can.

    A restrictive clause is essential to the grammatical and logical completeness of a sentence. A nonrestrictive clause, by contrast, is so loosely connected with the essential meaning of the sentence that it could be omitted without changing the meaning.

    Hence, three guidelines. First, if you cannot omit the clause without changing the basic meaning, the clause is restrictive; use "that" without a comma. Second, if you can omit the clause without changing the basic meaning, the clause is nonrestrictive; use a comma plus "which." Third, if you ever find yourself using a "which" that doesn't follow a comma (or a preposition), it probably needs to be a "that."

    2. I wish I could say I was the latter, but I don't know the rules and did poorly during the "parts of speech/grammar" portions of high school English. It's unfortunate, but for me, English (or, "Language Arts" as they styled it in grade school) was all about literature, prose, poetry, etc. - the part I enjoyed.
      I wish I was more conversant in the rules, but I have a terrible recall for such things, at times needing reminders of the appropriate usage for simple words like "accept v. except" or "who v. whom". You start throwing around "restrictive clause" or even "preposition" and I go a bit gooey between the ears. It's too bad, but so much of my writing is guided by whether or not it "sounds right", either in my head or out loud.

      1. I had a pretty strict composition teacher in high school, and I took all the advanced courses, but what made me feel like I finally had a better grip on English grammar was learning Russian as an adult. Learning a new language from the ground up with a complex case structure and verb conjugations really forced me to think about how sentences are put together in both languages. My only worry now is that I use Russian grammar or punctuation when writing in English.

            1. I learned German in high school and I remember only a tiny bit of it but I can still to this day read anything in German perfectly. I just don't know what I'm saying. It was really nice that when letters were put together in the same way were being pronounced the same way every time.

    1. This is a dead horse I'm more than happy to beat. I was just saying to a co-worker this morning that football at levels below high school should be criminalized.

      1. As I've mentioned before, our family has really struggled with this issue, as the 10-year-old boy has been asking to play for at least three years now. The neat thing is he hasn't been whiny or thrown a fit or been a jerk about it. But he does really, really want to play. It's been a very mature conversation. I'm proud of him and told him so.

        This year, I started asking his buddies who come over to play at the house whether they play football. Two of the 10 I've asked actually play. The rest aren't allowed to play or aren't allowed to play until they are older. Of the two that play, I've offered to take the boy to observe practice and/or games to see what is going on/what the coaches are doing. Are they running into each other for 60 minutes of practice? I don't know and there is zero information online about the orgarnization that runs the St. Paul youth football program.

        I printed off the article linked above, as well as the Globe story. Gonna make him read it when I get home.

        1. children that age generally lack the neck and core strength to properly protect themselves (such as one can) from collisions. I think the research has shown pretty compellingly that (a) contact practice does little or nothing to deter concussions in games, and (b) youngsters experience pretty significant hits in youth football in both contact practice and games, implying that contact practice should be minimized.

          1. Completely agree. Our main issue was with what is a youngster. When should it be okay has always be the question. We've struggled to come up with a rule so we don't have the same conversation every fall.

        1. vaguely related, bust out the fish oil!

          In a July publication of The Journal of Neurosurgery, Dr. Julian Bailes (BIRI) and Dr. Barry Sears (leading authority on anti-inflammatory nutrition, creator of Zone-Diet) found that supplementing rats with O3/DHA after head injuries reduced the observed issues with a concussion; (SOURCE via weightlosingideas.com)

          “Animals receiving the daily fish oil supplement for 30 days post concussion had a greater than 98 percent reduction in brain damage compared with the animals that did not receive the supplement,” Dr. Sears said. “It is hypothesized that the omega-3 fatty acids in the fish oil reduced the neural inflammation induced by the concussion injury.”

    2. I was a team manager for my high school's football team one year and I had to run and find a phone in the school during practice one day because of a neck injury. It turned out to just be a sprained neck, but it wasn't fun to be running around thinking a kid's life, or at least his mobility, could be at least partly up to how quickly I could find a phone to call for help.

  13. email from my wife this afternoon:

    Spoiler SelectShow

    Even women like scatalogical humor.

      1. We are beyond Twayn for this one. 600 miles from home, holiday weekend, 3 kids, etc.

        On 3rd appointment on the day. Just made a reservation at holiday inn express. I assume I will be able to fix the problem myself after a night's sleep.

    1. That might be the best work Gleeman's done on his site in a couple of years. That said, Gleeman loves to complain about the quality of comments on his site, but I don't see his replies to frightwig re: Mauer-as-a-third-baseman exactly rising to the level of deep thought, either. He breezily dismisses the idea out of hand on pretty flimsy grounds.

      As a side note, trading tweets about jazz with frightwig was the highlight of my week, and easily the best thing that's ever happened to me on Twitter.

  17. Byron Buxton is the Midwest League MVP, despite only playing a little over half the season there. Dalton Hicks and Adam Brett Walker II were also named to the league's all-star team.

  18. Samuel Deduno and Wilkin Ramirez are put on the DL. Darin Mastroianni and Pedro Hernandez called up.

      1. Maestro should be the starting CF based on his overall numbers are better than Clete's numbers vs. righthanders this year. Maestro's numbers vs. righties are almost as good as Clete's and Clete is better defensively. Really close. At the very least, hopefully Clete won't be starting against lefties anymore.

    2. Pedro Hernandez.

      I would say that they should give Hendriks the rest of the season to see whether or not he's even a candidate for the job starting next year, but I suppose they already know the answer to that.

      Fine, if you're going to have completely uninspiring pitchers, Pedro Hernandez is as uninspiring as any.

    3. Outstanding news on Deduno:

      Deduno also had an MRI exam on his right shoulder and it showed some issues with his labrum and rotator cuff. Will see specialist in MIN— Rhett Bollinger (@RhettBollinger) August 30, 2013

      Ramirez is done for the year.

    4. I feel really bad for Ramirez. This was his first real chance at regular playing time in the major leagues and he just hasn't been able to stay healthy. I just hope for him that this wasn't his final chance.

  20. Btw, greetings from Maple Grove. I flew in yesterday on a standby flight so I can attend my parents' 50th wedding anniversary shindig tomorrow night. Had to get up at 4 a.m. to get to the airport by 5 a.m. only to be bumped from my 6 a.m. flight. I was originally told that the next flight wouldn't be until that afternoon, but then the friend that works for United that originally got my flight got me switched to a flight that was just 20 minutes later. I was originally going through Denver and would then have to go through Houston, so I wouldn't get to MSP until 3:30 instead of 12:30, but that was much better than spending all morning in an airport or even possibly having to go home and come back later. I made the connecting flight and wasn't bumped, so a good day overall. The return trip also will be standby, but hopefully it will go as smoothly.

  21. Phil Miller ‏@MillerStrib
    Terry Ryan says the Twins and Royals settled up for the Jamey Carroll trade today. The Twins' end? Said the GM, "Cash, Homey."

    this cant be real

        1. On the bright side, we got 154,000 out of the minivan. On the dark side, we are buying a new one in the morning after spending another night in the great state of South Dakota.

    1. I don't know if anyone is still around but this Bison-KState game is pretty good. NDSU down by 4 but driving with about 7 minutes left.

        1. Bison on KState 30 with 2:00 remaining. They may need to be a little more urgent, They moved 50 yards in like 6 minutes

          1. I think they want to make sure they don't leave much time on the clock.

            I imagine butts are getting pretty puckered in Manhattan.

            1. I'm dying there. Holy hell, NDSU has manhandled them all night. K-State faster, but NDSU has dominated the line of scrimmage.

              1. As if we already didn't know, it's even more apparent the Huskers hired the wrong former defensive assistant a few years back.

    2. did you see that next week's Gophers game is only available locally on something called BTN2Go.com?

      I dialed up for the Michigan St game that going on now and the feed is awful. Especially when you stack it up against NBC's EPL streams.

      1. Bison just completely dominated the lines of scrimmage. KSU could not run the ball at all. Bison just chewed up yardage. KSU had their entire offensive line back from last year.

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