Game 150: Indians 10, Cuddy & the Kids 4

Stop me if you've heard this before, but the Twins lost again to extend another losing streak. This one is at seven and it is the sixth losing streak of at least six games this season. The Twins are 0-40 in those losing streaks and 59-51 the rest of the time. I imagine that's not all that unusual for teams this bad, but the Twins have been real streaky this season. It's hard to remember that they actually won eight games in a row at one point. Then again, the Twins haven't won as much as three in a row since July 5, which happened to be the one game I attended.

But this time of year for a last-place team isn't about wins and losses, especially when you only have one member of your Opening Day lineup available to play and only one member of your original five-man rotation still pitching in the rotation. And let's face it. Any wins now only hurt the Twins' draft position and have no real tangible benefit. It's just about pride now.

This is about seeing the kids playing and seeing some hope for the future and the last two games have been good in that sense. On Friday, it was Joe Benson showing why he's considered by some to be the Twins' top prospect that could actually make the team next year when he went 4-for-4 with three extra-base hits against a very tough right-hander in Ubaldo Jiminez. In this game, it was Chris Parmelee showing why the Twins took him in the first round of the draft, going 3-for-3 with a walk and his first-career home run. Parmelee is now batting .357 in the bigs and more impressively has five walks and just four strikeouts.

Who’s up for a game of Werewolf?

Since the Twins' season is basically over and today's game is going nowhere fast, I propose we play a game of Werewolf. For those of you who have played Mafia before, it's basically the same game.

If you're interested in playing, send me an email. My email address is (mynamehere)@gmail.com. I'd like to get around 7-9 players. Once we have enough players, I will declare registration over and send you your role via email. For those of you who are werewolves, I will also tell you the identities of your fellow werewolves. Here's how it works:

The goal of the villagers is to kill all the werewolves before they are outnumbered.  If they do so, the villagers are declared the winners (even the villagers who have been killed).  If at any point the werewolves outnumber the villagers during the day, they can simply come out and kill everyone, so they win.  The thing that makes this tricky is that during the day, everybody looks like a villager, so the villagers have no idea who among them is actually a werewolf.  On the other hand, the werewolves know who each other are.

The game consists of two phases--a day phase and a night phase.

DAY PHASE:  Debate begins between everybody in the village and everybody gets to vote for somebody to eliminate.  Once a single player has a majority, I will declare it to be NIGHT.  That player will be killed and his or her role will be revealed.

NIGHT PHASE:  Everybody in the village goes to bed (i.e. no posting is allowed).  The werewolves will select a villager to kill and send the name to me via email.  Once I get a name from the werewolves, I will declare it to be DAY.  That villager's name will be revealed and he will be dead.

Once a player is killed, they are out of the game forever.  So no posting when you're dead!   The game ends when all the werewolves are dead or the werewolves outnumber the villagers during the day.  There are other "special" roles that can be added which add intrigue and complexity to the game.

The actual game will take place over at Spooky's blog.

2011 Game 149 Recap: Indians 7, Twins 6

Weather: 56 degrees, overcast
Wind: 14 mph, R to L
Time: 2:58
Attendance: 37,942

Box Score
Fangraphs

Yeah, it was just like old times. Jim Thome steps to the plate at Target Field and belts a solo shot, career home run #603. Only this time he was wearing an Indians uniform again, Joe Nathan was trying to keep the game even, and the home run made the difference between a potential come-from-behind Twins win and another Twins loss. So it goes.

Kevin Slowey had another poor outing for the Twins, going just four innings and giving up five runs on seven hits. But what the hell, this is the time of year when everything heads south, so we really shouldn't expect any different.

The one bright spot in the game for the Twins was Joe Benson, who damn near hit for the cycle and provided a good chunk of the team's offense, scoring three runs with a 4-for-4 night. Benson has doubled in four of his last five games, and six of his nine hits in the Majors have gone for extra bases. His four hits were the most for a Twins rookie since Danny Valencia did it last year.

Game. Cleveland vs. Minnesota

It's sort of sad that the Twins will never win another baseball game. I was a fan of the occasional win, but if I can't have that, I guess watching errors and strikeouts will have to get me by.

I'll be listening to this one, driving to Brainerd on a road trip with the wife. Since this one is obviously impossible, let's at least make it close.

Gomez vs Swizzlestick, who seems to be our best starter lately. Who knows, maybe we'll only lose by three?

Happy Birthday–September 17

Ezra Sutton (1850)
Shiki Masaoka (1867)
Willie Sudhoff (1874)
Frank Schulte (1882)
Sheriff Blake (1899)
Hughie Critz (1900)
Chase Riddle (1925)
Orlando Cepeda (1937)
Bobby Wine (1938)
Thad Bosley (1956)
John Franco (1960)
Dan Haren (1980)

There do not appear to be any players with connections to the Minnesota Twins who were born on this day.

Remodeled basement. Same half-baked taste.