Cabin Twelve

The Twins lost to the Yankees for the 374th time this year.

Joe Mauer is still miffed about getting left at home during Game 6 of the 1991 World Series.

An interesting look at the defense of the AL playoff teams. Not surprisingly (to me at least), the Twins aren’t that good defensively.

A Yankees fan has projections for the Twins in the ALDS. Seems about right to me. And speaking of projections, it’s never too early to start thinking about next year. The Baseball Think Factory has the ZiPS Projections for the 2010 Twins up already.

Game 163 II was a big hit on Twin Cities TV, with 469,000 local televisions tuning in.

The Ft. Myers Miracle are looking for a fan that was caught on camera on Tuesday. Someone buy me a hat.

The Twins are not “Small Market Champions.” Call them small revenue (for now), if you must. But the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro are is the 13th most populous in the US. And the Twins do very well on television. (Click the image on the right of the post to see all teams ratings on their regional sports network.)

Its not Twins related, but Deadspin ran an excellent 2 part article by Eric Walker, the man ostensibly behind Moneyball (that’s a pretty gross simplification of things, but I’ll leave it at that). Walker comes across sounding a little bitter and I can’t for the life of me figure out why he chose to run this with Deadspin, but its worth taking the time to read. Part I. Part II.

I don’t have anything else to say about game 163 II, except wow. Was it the greatest baseball game in Metrodome history? Hard to rank it above Game 7 of the 1991 World Series, but it was certainly up there.

The AP wrap. And the mlb.com summary, just for kicks.

Fangraphs has the Twins win probability throughout tonight’s game. Wildly fluctuating.

The Twins were the 3rd straight home team to win a tie-breaker. And the second to play in two. And the only team to play in one in back to back seasons. Meanwhile, the Tigers collapse was historic. Joe Mauer was exhilarated, Twins fans are euphoric and pooped, Torii Hunter is rooting for the Twins to beat the Yankees and at least one person says Michael Cuddyer should be the MVP. Also, Miguel Cabrera is sorry.

The fond farewell to baseball at the Mall of America Field at Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome, will happily have to wait for at least a few more days. The place won’t die, as Joe Posnanski writes. (Posnanski’s post, along with being generally amusing, also resurrects an old Dan Quisenberry quote about the dome from back in the day. “I don’t think there are any good uses for nuclear weapons but, then, this might be one.”)

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Well well well. An interesting final two games in Detroit. I was going to ignore the actual, you know, games here until the regular season start in 2010, but its kind of hard to ignore what’s gone on the last couple of days. First up, the afternoon tilt in Detroit:

Nate Robertson hit Denard Span in the 3rd, Scott Baker returned the favor in the 4th by hitting Marcus Thames (and went inside on him again in the 5th. Not a huge deal, though I’m sure the tempers were surging, given the import of the series and the intensity of the games. And that brings us to Jose Mijares in the bottom of the 8th. After sailing a pitch behind Adam Everett, both teams were warned. Next inning, Jeremy Bonderman hits the first batter on the first pitch and he’s tossed in a hurry. Delmon is pissed, not at Bonderman, but at Mijares. Watch the video here. The Twins win 8-3 and (barely) keep their playoff hopes alive.

A few quotes from the Twins and some other news after the jump.

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It turned into a relatively big news day for the Twins today – not to mention the big doubleheader against the Tigers, the Twins have reportedly made a rather impressive splash on the International Free Agent scene and announced a big Target Field deal. Oh, and Chuck Knoblauch.

I can’t be alone in being shocked that the Twins have agreed to terms with 16 year old Dominican shortstop Miguel Angel Sano on a contract with a cool $3.15 million bonus. When its made official, it will become the biggest bonus given to an International free agent this year and the 2nd largest ever. Wow. Bill Smith has had a rocky start, given the Santana & Bartlett/Garza trades, but he sure ain’t as gun shy as Terry Ryan.

No real surprise here, but Best Buy will have a presence at Target Field, as the Twins announced a marketing deal with them today.

And here’s the story about Chuck Knoblauch’s umm, “dispute” with his common-law wife. Also, the Wall Street Journal checks in with some commentary and some of the legalities behind common-law marriage in Texas. Hey, weren’t you wondering too?

And yeah, the paper in Ft. Myers did publish instructions for would be mascots written by Miss A-Miracle, the Ft. Myers Miracle mascot. Oookay. Its got nothing on the Miracle’s previously planned What Would Tim Tebow Do? Night earlier this summer.

A few random Twins related tidbits.

A lot of Twins fans get on Gardy, but you can count Sparky Anderson among his fans. Anderson pulled Gardenhire aside for a little chat in Detroit and Gardy had this to say: “”I was in awe, he really likes what we do here. That was pretty cool. It was honestly one of those times when you just melt.”

And Jeff Passan checks in with a nice column about Gardy this week too.

USA Today has two articles about the Twins stadiums today. One about “fancy” new Target Field and one about the Metrodome. I’ll be the first to agree with Ozzie Guillen’s opinion of the Dome, but a lot of cool things took place there.

And speaking of Target Field, the Star Tribune has an interesting article about the impact the current lending environment is having on development around the new park. If you’re into that kind of thing.

mlb.com brings us a good little profile of Max Kepler-Rozycki, the 16 year old from Germany that the Twins gave the biggest bonus for a European free agent to this summer. It’ll be interesting to watch his development, and I’m sure we’ll have a few years to watch.

In minor league news, this is about a week old now, but the Twins have let go of Rochester Red Wings manager Stan Cliburn.