Morning After Poll: How are you doing?

No more baseball for half a year. I hope the Brewers or Rays win the WS, I probably won’t be watching though. sigh..

But that’s normal. I’m thinking about what could’ve been: a three game sweep by the Rays.

I’m still upset with that stupid rule, but there is nothing I can do about that. I don’t know if I really want to get over this loss so soon. I want to sit on it for a few days before I move on and become Ray fans and look to the future in Minnesota.

I realized that this has been a very entertaining season. I truly got my money’s worth in being a Twins fan. The so called sports pundits that picked us to finish anywhere from last to third were so horribly wrong that they should find jobs at McDonald’s as the supervisor of french fries. Even that job may be too tough for them. As a team we overachieved to the max. Several players had break out seasons and the starting rotation proved that there is life after Santana and Silva. The glass is most definitely half full for next year and I can’t wait for spring training to start. I may even have to visit Florida in March this year. So, my mourning period is over and I am counting the days until opening day in a new stadium. Go Twins…..

Our 2nd place finish was just as attributable to the mediocrity of the Central than it is to the team, or to Ron Gardenhire. For those of you trashing the pundits, or complaining the Twins don’t deserve anything, or calling for the firing of Gardenhire or Smith – please get a grip.

The Indians inexplicably imploded. So did the Tigers. Chicago and Cleveland both had injuries that were more devastating to their teams than our team did. We lost Neshek – the White Sox lost the arguable league MVP. We lost Cuddyer, but Span was arguably more effective this year than Cuddyer was in 2007.

Our success is a product of those teams’ failures. Nonetheless our team played hard, put out a good product and battled all season (with the possible exception of that stinker against the Royals last week after sweeping the White Sox).

If your definition of “we didn’t ‘deserve’ it” is that we didn’t pull away from the Sox when we had our chances than no one from the Central “deserved” anything. Neither did anyone from the East as neither Boston nor Tampa pulled away from the other, or from the wild card competitors. Chicago didn’t “deserve” it any more than we didn’t “deserve” it.

What about the gutsy, gritty performance in that last sweep of the White sox last week? When you factor in the late come from behind victory when the Twins players and staff refused to give up I would argue that we deserved it as much as anyone else did.

Every team blows games they shouldn’t. It is a long season. We also won some games that we shouldn’t have. Stole some, in fact, through a never give up attitude that I believe Ron Gardenhire deserves a lot of credit for. For those of you pointing to Seattle or KC, how about refreshing your selective memory (as mine isn’t good enough admittedly – I can’t even remember what I had for brakfast this morning) and making a more honest assessment that includes the series’ we either stole or outperformed, like the 4 against the white hot angels in Anaheim.

Anyone who thought Minnesota was an elite team at any point in this season was (or is) smoking crack, and if any of you listened to that, and are using that to fuel your sour grapes attitudes this morning than I feel sorry for you. This season is what it was. A ggod season by a slightly overperforming group of youngsters and role players who got lucky due to other team’s miseries, and outperformed expectations because of that, combined with the type of grit, hustle, and lunchbucket mentality that we love from our Minnesota sports teams. Get over it.

…but you guys should just be pissed that the game wasn’t in Minnesota. You guys had the season series, and finished the season on time, unlike Chicago. Hopefully Tampa puts them away in three.

Good luck, and GO TIGERS.

Perhaps dormant is a better word. I’ll be watching the playoffs, but my Twins fan side has gone dormant, and I know it’s not coming back for awhile. It’s the beginning of the end now.

I wore my hat today to “honor the fallen.” One of my friends joked I was acting like it was 9/11 or something.

It hurts every time, but as I’ve said to people, it’s not like we can’t take it, just put it in line with the long list of Minnesota Sports disappointments. 2002, 2004, and 2006 probably hurt worse. 1998 Vikings probably was worse too.

We’ll get one… someday…