Think Happy Thoughts

Yesterday I started writing a post. It was about going to a company meeting, and how dismal it is to sit in a cramped, stuffy hotel conference room munching on stale party mix while a bunch of management types smile through clenched teeth and try to convince you that, despite their having bungled everything so badly that it became necessary to lay off 10% of the workforce (but not, mind you, of the management staff) last week, everything is going to be perfectly okay now. I wondered how dumb they think we are, to expect us not to realize that the people who f***ed it all up are still in charge. I remarked upon how disheartening it was to look around and realize that most of your (remaining) peers are swallowing this bullshit hook, line and sinker. Then I realized I was turning phrases around way too many words starting with "d" and besides I was getting pretty depressed glum just remembering it, so I just trashed the whole thing and went to the Twins game.

At first, it didn't look like the game was going to be much better than the post-writing. We were fielding the "B" team behind Brad "My Kingdom For Some Run Support" Radke, and Detroit had a lefthander on the mound. Then Brad coughed up the obligatory first-inning runs (two of them), putting the Twins in a hole, and the Twins went down meekly 1-2-3 in the bottom of the inning.

Note: nine games into the season, the Twins are the only ML team which has yet to score first in a game. Pride is not what I'm feeling here, boys, 6-3 record aside.

Ah, but then...

Then Radke said, "I want a 1-2-3 inning!" and he went out and got himself one. The guys in the field said, "Hey, Radke needs some run support!" and they ran to the dugout and grabbed their lucky eyeglasses--the better to see all the balls Detroit lefty Nate Robertson threw outside of the strikezone--and on two walks, two hits and a hit-by-pitch they tied up the game.

Mr. Radke liked that 1-2-3 feeling, so he pitched himself another in the top of the third. The Twins hitters said, "Hey, let's try something different and score 1-2-3 instead of going down that way!" Ably assisted by Mr. Robertson, who hit one, walked one, and gave up two hits, and Omar Infante, who committed a well-timed error at second, they did indeed score three.

It was all pretty much over at that point. Sure, the Tigers would manage two more runs, and Gardy would be ejected when he got a teensy bit angry about the umpire warning both dugouts after Radke just barely brushed Marcus Thames' jersey with an inside fastball. But the Twins would put another five runs on the board, and the brooms would come out, and many a fan would have a good laugh at Dmitri Young's expense.

"Control issues" was the phrase of the day for the Tigers, as their pitchers (they used four) combined to face 44 batters, pitching themselves into six full counts, allowing eleven hits, a mind-boggling nine walks, and hitting two batters while striking out only three. I think the whole team had a little too much Starbucks, because the defense was almost as wild as the pitching, accumulating three errors. Try the decaf, guys.

And Brad Radke actually got run support. To steal a line from Bull Durham: "It's a miracle!"