Game 154: Blue Jays at Twins

Time: 7:10 Central. Vegas Line: -145 TOR / MIN +120

Weather: Fall is here, start temp 58°

Opponent’s SB site: Bluebird Banter

TV: BS North. Radio: How people in fiction communicate after a zombie apocalypse even though it’s unlikely radios would work

Yep, it’s José Berríos time! I mean, it was on Sunday, too, but now he’s at “home.” He’ll be facing off against the best of the Twins’ 2021 late-season “throw the last healthy guys we don’t expect to be future rotation regulars out there and see if any surprise us” squad, Bailey Ober. Ober’s last start on Saturday wasn’t very good, and La Makina’s on Sunday was easily good enough. YTD digits:

This week’s edition of Stuff TwinkieTowners own comes courtesy of our indefatigable Blog Pope, TJ! (Written before TJ announced he was, indeed, fatigable... but the show must go on.) And he’s giving This Stuff away, to somebody who comments in this gamethread! Presuming that 1: anybody comments in this gamethread and 2: anybody who does wants this Stuff. And what Stuff is it that SB siterunners always seem to accumulate? Why, bobble heads, naturally!

OK, at first I saw this only in the thumbnail version, and I thought it was Nelson Cruz because Fire Bat + Goatee.

And I thought this one was Byron Buxton, because it’s partially broken, as Buxton always seems to be.

In my defense, I WAS looking at the thumbnails. Also, I grew up on “Star Wars” figures. Those figures looked nothing like Carrie Fisher, Harrison Ford, Mark Hamill, Billy Dee Williams, etc.... only the creatures and robots and stormtroopers looked anything like their movie versions. Making dolls look like people is HARD. (Teaching children to memorize the nonsense name "IG-88" is easy.)

I was informed that the giveaway had to be Totally Random, so, without further ado:

— GIVEAWAY ENTRY AND WINNING PRIZE RULES —

Entry: in the gamethread, state you’re entering, and pick a number between 0-99. (Whole numbers only, math pedants; no decimals or fractions.) First person to post any number gets it; one entry per commenter. No entries will be accepted after the first pitch of the eighth inning. (I’m also assuming nobody on the TwinkieTown masthead can enter.)

Winning: whichever number is closest to the last two numbers of the last pitcher’s final ERA wins. (If it’s an infinite ERA posted by some guy who’s never pitched before, then the pitcher before him.) Closeness counting will wrap around at 00, so if the final ERA is x.01, 99 is closer than 4. If there’s a tie, the winner will be the “over” if Minnesota wins, “under” if they lose. (Example: final ERA x.01, entries are 99 and 3. 99 would be the “under," 3 the "over" here.)

Got it? Doesn’t matter if you do. Just means we're not mailing bobbleheads to favorites. Trust me; I drive for a stressful transportation job, so I resent everyone else who drives, or walks/bikes/uses public transit, you're all in my way, I have no favorites.

Prize: Closest number gets their pick of the two bobbleheads, second-closest (or loser of the tiebreaker) gets the other one. TJ will mail them to you. (And is paying postage himself, even without his SB job anymore, meaning he'll probably have to sell the family dog.) If there’s only one entry, that person gets both! Methinks there will be at least two.

This is kinda inspired by the old mafia-run "numbers" racket, where the winning number would be daily published horse betting statistics or stock exchange closings. But we aren’t endorsing gambling on the ponies or Wall Street here, as readers know I and TJ are both cut from immaculate moral cloth.

Oh, and entries will also be cut off at 100 if we get more than that which... we won’t. Thanks to TJ for parting with some of his swag! (And also for being a terrific siterunner, we’ll miss you.)