Twins at Kansas City. Royals 12, Twins 3.

At 3:15 this morning, the members of the Minnesota Twins were fast asleep in their beds, teddy bears snuggled at their sides, night lights lit, night caps capped, chests rising and falling in perfect harmony, small drool puddles on their pillows, dreams of division championships dancing in their heads.

At 3:30 these same Minnesota Twins found themselves in the ballroom of their Kansas City hotel bleary-eyed and woozy. A tornado had swept through downtown Kansas City, and no, it wasn't Justin Morneau.

So the Twins mulled around the ballroom, making fun of each other's jammies. Hunter, they found, sleeps in red silk pajamas with his number embroidered on the left butt cheek. Corey Koskie has a nice flannel man-dress spotted with moose. And Lew Ford has a swanky Spiderman set. And, as the guests of said Kansas City hotel learned, Matt LeCroy does not wear jammies.

YAWN...What's all the fuss about?

The Twins were only out of their beds for about a half-an-hour, but the damage was done. "Man," said Jacque Jones, "I don't think I'm going be able to hit for another week!"

"I know," said Lew Ford, "I get all spazzy when I don't get my eight hours."

"Damn skippy," said Torii Hunter, "my eyes are going be all puffy tomorrow. I'll look like Colin Powell. I can't hit when I look like Colin Powell."

Fortunately for Kansas City fans, the tornado left the Royals alone. Well-rested and chipper, the team that didn't score any runs in three games against the Twins last week managed eleven in the first four innings. And really, good for them. I mean, we all felt so sorry for them last week, it was just painful to watch. Nice for them to get some runs. But really, can't you do it against someone else? We're just not so good at the offense-thing right now; we could use a little more mothering and a little less Mother Nature.

On the subject of natural disasters, Batgirl has heard the cries of fans who are ready to fire Dougie and install Justin Morneau at first base. And if this game of baseball were all about offense, Batgirl would shout, "hear hear!" But, alas, Abner Doubleday deviously designed the game so that one must catch the ball as well as hit it—and that Dougie sure knows how to catch the ball good. The Twins are designed around pitching and defense; we're not going to score a lot of runs (cough) but what we can do is keep the other team from scoring too many (usually). Dougie saves doubles every game. And the infield hasn't made an on-target throw to first base in three years. They just don't have to—Dougie's a vacuum cleaner out there. (Dear Mr. Frightwig: Please, no sucking jokes. Love, Batgirl).

Anyway, in the 4th inning tonight, with the Twins down 7-1, Tony Graffanino laid down a bunt for a base hit. Corey fielded the ball, made a slightly off-target throw to 1st—though no more off-target than usual—and Morneau couldn't get to it, so Graffanino made it to third. Since the Twins suffer from institutionalized "group think" every other player decided that sucking defensively sounded like a barrel of laughs and Guzie, Rivas, and Roa all muffled plays. They looked like the Royals or something. That's right; the Morneau miss on the errant Koskie throw spiraled the fragile and fatigued Twins' psyches so out of control that they turned into the Kansas City Royals. We just can't take those kind of mistakes.

The Royals, meanwhile, were doing a Yankees impersonation—if the Yankees had David De Jesus leading off. Perhaps the next time a tornado comes through town it will take all the Twins offensive woes with them. Because the schedule starts heating up soon and the Twins will find they're not in Kansas City anymore.

BatAlert: The game will be at 12:15 tomorrow.

Posted by Batgirl at July 16, 2004 09:35 PM