Cooler Heads Prevail

I pride myself on trying to come up with cheesy headlines I feel could be used by sports columnists the morning after a ballgame. Although I struck out on this mornings local Sports sections, the headline will remain here.

In the Twins first game back from the All-Star break they went down to Texas and beat the Rangers 5-3. It was good to see Alexi Casilla pick up where he left off before his heading to the minor leagues a few months ago (0-4 on Friday night). I'm not going to say that the Twins necessarily need Casilla to have a solid second half of the season in order to win the division, but it's more about the amount of guys they can afford to have in the lineup hitting below .240. It's obvious they need a guy that can hit for average and play second base or shortstop. Ideally, the Twins would like to have Punto return to his form of 2006 where he essentially played every day and hit .290. That's not going to happen this year, so unless Casilla picks it up, we're looking at middle infield combo of Punto/Tolbert/Harris.

I've already convinced myself that the Twins won't make any worthwhile trades before the July 31st trading deadline. The Twins are a "professional sports organization" version of me. They only do what is necessary when they have to. Much like when my bathtub was leaking into the woman's condo below me. If it was up to me, I would have let that bad boy leak until my bathtub was laying on her couch.

In the four years I've been living in my condo I've only had one leaky pipe, and as much as it burned me to spend money on something I didn't have control over, I fixed it the correct way by having new piping put in, followed by replacing the ceiling. In other words, the right way to fix a problem. The Twins on the other hand seem to have a few leaking pipes every year and their solution year after year is to put a slab of Big League Chew over the leak in hopes that it holds. Every now and again that piece of gum will keep the leak in check for the rest of the year, but let's be honest, the Twins have been on the good side of the bursting pipe gods too many times. Doing things on the cheap will get them burned and if things aren't going to change by the time the new stadium opens next year I have a feeling there will be a lot of rain delays. Only that won't be rain coming from the sky. That will be the leaking bathtub of the late Carl Pohlad as he sits over Target Field.

Record: 46-44