Anaheim at Twins. Twins 10, Angels 0.

Three months ago the Anaheim Angels came to town after the Twins had burned through April like General Sherman through Atlanta. The Twins had had the best record in the AL for much of that month, thanks to the replacement player stylins of Lew Ford, Jose Offerman, and Henry "Please Don't Hurt 'Em" Blanco.

Then it was time for us to get tested—Anaheim, Seattle, and Oakland were coming to party, AL West style. And the lowly Twins surely couldn't keep up.

Well, we didn't. In that series with the Angels, we lost two of three—both losses featured terrific performances by our starting pitchers that were utterly blown by a bullpen that had not yet discovered its Juan-derfulness. All was Bat-chaos after that; we lost a couple series, then seemed to recover, winning five in a row and then took series from the Blue Jays and the Bitch Sox—and then we didn't win another game for six weeks. Not one. And it wasn't as if we were losing to, like, real baseball teams. We lost to the Devil Rays of Tampa Bay, to the Royals of Kansas City, to the Beer Gogglers of Milwaukee, the Kitty Cats of Detroit, and, worst of all, to the Bitch Sox of ChiTown. Oh, the humanity!

I like to call it the "sucking-time." For there was so very, very, very much sucking—you could build the biggest vacuum in the whole wide world and it wouldn't suck as much as we sucked. I've written a song about it, sung to the Fox Sports Net game theme which goes:

Twins, they suck and suck and suck and suck
They can't hit the ball worth a flying crap!
It's real depressing watching the Twins suck
Soon Batgirl will rip out her own eyeballs!

Ahem.

Well, after a little post All-Star break lag, the sucking seems to be over, and the…what's the opposite of sucking? …Blowing?

Huh. How strange. You get the thing, and the thing's opposite, and they are the very same. We have come back to the beginning. The circle is unbroken. The ends have justified the means. It must mean something. Like the Twins being five games up.

Anyway, we're not sucking or blowing; in fact we've won 12 of our last 14 and are the second team in the AL to reach 60 wins. Much has been made of the Twins tough schedule in August, and like presidential candidate Johan Santana, I say bring 'em on. We want to win the division and compete in the postseason; we've got to beat these guys. So, come over Bitch Sox, Red Sox, Athletics, Rangers, and Yankees. Come on over to our house, and let's get this party started.

The Angels are here again, and I don't think anyone's intimidated (even people who probably should be) for the groove that had been lost has now been found. For we were shaking our groove-thing all over the field tonight; you could see it in the performance of Carlos Silva, who calmly put on 169 baserunners and just as calmly got them all out on double plays. You could see it in the smooth base-stealing jazz of Torii "I'm Like a Shadow" Hunter. (You can't catch him, Benjie Molina's Younger Brother, you can't even see him.) You could see it in the easy competence of our defense, turning double plays . And, oh my dears, you could see it in our bats. Boom! went Torii Hunter, Boom! went Corey Koskie, Boom! went Henry Blanco, Boom! went Justin Morneau. Plus Shannon "Please Be Careful" Stewart went 3 for 4 and Corey "Everything Hurts" Koskie took yet another one for the team.

And did I mention Carlos Silva? He got left out of the whole complete-game shutout orgy last month, but tonight he stood on the mound and said, "It is my turn, you know? For it is the turn which is mine!" And this wasn't some pansy-ass team like the Royals, this was a real freakin' team. And you know what? I think he just let all those guys get lead-off base hits just to show-off. I think he said to himself, "Self? Let's get a bunch of double plays today. That would be cool, you know?"

So we're just at the beginning of this spell against, you know, good teams (read: not AL Central) but it is not a time to fear, for we are the Minnesota Twins, we are hale and hearty, we are full of wholesomeness and team players, we are on a roll, our hitters are strong and our pitchers (mostly) are stronger, we have a great presidential candidate (have you voted for the VP?)--and we have Shannon Stewart and Justin Morneau, and you do not.

Breathe in the fresh air, my BatLings. Let your lungs fill with it, for it is August and the Minnesota Twins are here to play ball.