Tampa Bay at Twins. Twins 12, Devil Rays 2.

I hate to bring up bad memories when things have been going so gosh darned well—I mean a three game winning streak! Against such powerhouses as the Tigers and the Devil Rays! I do declare! But, anyway—it must be said that about eight weeks ago the Tampa Bay Devil Rays came to town. The Twins had just lost a series to them, but that was an aberration, right? Wrong. The Devil Rays loosened their belts, took the Twins to the woodshed and spanked them with the gleeful abandon of BatGranddaddy after too much moonshine.

This was after a miserable May, and it seemed to portend dark things for June. There was so very much sucking then, and the sucking just didn't stop. There have been times when we thought it was over; we'd enjoy patches of sunlight—Seattle, the Mets, the Expos, the BoSox—but then the sucking came back, relentless, inevitably. And it is only by the grace of true Bitch Sox generosity that we are still in this thing at all—much less in first place today. Thank you, Bitch Sox!

What the Twins needed, it turns out, was an exorcism. Really, we should have known; for the last two months, Doug Mientkiewicz has been projectile vomiting all over the place, Corey Koskie's head's been spinning around, and Torii Hunter's been blaspheming like the dickens.

Yes, my dears—we had been possessed. Our only hope was to confront our demons—and beat the stuffing out of them. So when Satan's minions—I mean the Devil Rays—came to town again, it was time for us to whip out our best Max Von Sydow impressions and show them who's really in charge.

At first, it didn't seem like the Twins were ready. Radke hasn't really been in form for his last couple of starts, and when he loaded the bases with no outs in the second, it seemed the Twins might be lost forever to the powers of darkness.

But then—did you see? In the middle of the 4th inning Terry Ryan got up on top of the Twins dugout clutching a homer hanky chanting, "The power of Justin Morneau compels you, the power of Justin Morneau compels you!" There was a lot of thrashing and levitating at that point, and Scotty Ullger got pitched down the clubhouse stairs, but you know what? It worked! Lew Ford doubled, then Morneau hit a beautiful single—and oh, were the Twins compelled. Jones doubled, then John Halama walked Cuddy to get to Henry Blanco, who in the second inning had already hit the ball right at a poor unsuspecting T.C. Bear who was innocently entertaining America's children in the left field seats. Blanco fixed his steely eyes on Halama and muttered, "Nobody walks to get to me," then sliced the ball to center, scoring two. Then Luivas came up and with one swing, the Twins were quite well exorcised.

There was something distinctly retro about tonight's victory—what with Henry Blanco returning to his Crahnk-o form, Brad Radke looking shaky (at first), and the Twins lighting up the scoreboard like a team with some sort of offense—it seemed like it was April all over again. And April is, as we know, the coolest month.

Except, of course, October—if the power of Justin Morneau compels us.

Posted by Batgirl at July 21, 2004 10:20 PM