Article: Game Thread: Twins@A's 5/30 3:00PM

[Riverbrian]

Memorial Day isn’t just a day off from work… The Memorial Part is quite important.

Those who served and sacrificed have earned that respect and they deserve the honor.

It’s also a day to remember the loved ones that you’ve lost.

Today can also be a day to remember the Twins players that are no longer with us:
Bob Allison, George Banks, Earl Battey, Reno Bertoia, Bub Bloomfield, Walt Bond, Lyman Bostock, Dave Boswell, Ken Brett, Fred Bruckbauer, Terry Bulling, Bobby Castillo, Carmelo Castillo, Dean Chance, Jackie Collum, Billy Consolo, Jerry Crider, Bert Cueto, Joe Decker, Mike Fornieles, Paul Giel, Ruben Gomez, Herman Hill, Steve Howe, Riccardo Ingram, Lamar Jacobs, Pat Kelly, Harmon Killebrew, Ron Kline, John Klippstein, Jack Kralick, Craig Kusick, Charlie Lea, Jim Lemon, Joe Lis, Dwight Lowry, Danny McDevitt, Georges Maranda, Billy Martin, Marty Martinez, Danny McDevitt, Bob Miller, Don Mincher, Dan Monzon, Ray Moore, Joe Niekro, Ed Palmquist, Frank Pastrore, Wally Post, Vic Power, Kirby Puckett, Jim Roland, John Roseboro, Ted Sadowski, Al Schroll, Chuck Stobbs, Frank Sullivan, Danny Thompson, Cesar Tovar, Bill Tuttle, Ted Uhlaender, Elmer Valo, Zoilo Versalles, Bob Veselic, Jay Ward, Vic Wertz, Pete Wisenhant, Bill Whitby, Don Williams, Jerry Zimmerman.

This list was compiled by Jim Thielman and posted on his website cooloftheevening.com. It would have been much easier to just provide a link to his website but I felt it was more respectful to type out each name myself and so I opted to copy the names by hand and not link. I just want to make sure that Jim Thielman gets full credit for the listing the names.

Here are some things to think about:

 

 

1. Memory – I have a theory that eventually you just run out of RAM. You reach a certain age where your brain just can’t hold any more and when you learn new things… something has to fall out to make room for the new information. For example… I was surfing the web this morning and learning some new things and right now… at this very moment… I can’t remember where I put my car keys.


2. – Post-It Notes -- These little things were invented right here in Minnesota by Romy and Michele. My wife likes to post them honey-do style on the fridge. If a few days go by and they are still on the fridge and still unacted upon. She will take them off the fridge and stick them on my forehead. I tell her that this makes them really hard to read but she still does it anyway.

3. Bedtime – If you have to memorize something… experts say that the best thing to do is to study right before bed and right after waking. In a nutshell… too much crap happens during the main waking hours of the day to keep you from retaining new information. I can personally say that this method does indeed work because every night I read Twins Daily and every morning I read Twins Daily and can easily remember that the Twins have won 4 games in a row.


4. Good Times Bad Times – We do seem to have a tendency to remember the bad times more easily than the good times. I… on the other hand… only remember good times because I try to turn the bad times into good times and therefore only remember good times even if they were originally bad times.


5. Russ – I met Russ back in the 90’s when he was a young 70 something. I worked alongside him for maybe 10 years at the scorer’s table of many Basketball and Football games. I gave him crap and he gave it right back and I enjoyed every minute. It must have been 5 years into our working relationship that I found out that he was a Veteran of WWII. It took maybe 5 years because he never talked about it. It wasn’t that he couldn’t or wouldn’t talk about it… it just never came up in our conversation and that’s probably because I was more apt to talk about the flavor of a Banana then something important like this. Russ was a Lieutenant with the 164th Infantry. The 164th was the first Army unit to engage in offensive action at Guadalcanal in the Pacific providing reinforcements for the Marines already onshore and at the time in a deadlock with Japan in a battle for control of a strategic location in the South Pacific and the airfields on the island. The Island was nicknamed “Green Hell” and the 164th were green themselves and barely unpacked when the Japanese attempted to reclaim an airfield and ran out of the jungles in the middle of the night backed by air and naval support. The unit bent but did not break and they held the airfield despite overwhelming Japanese numbers. Taking a look at the scoreboard from that night… there were over 1,700 Japanese casualties while only 26 killed from the 164th. It was quite an introduction to the War for the unit and it impressed the Marines so much that the unit received the nickname the 164th Marines from the Marines. Russ made it all seem routine as he talked about it. The complete darkness of night, heavy tropical rain while holding off a full scale assault on their position, battling for control of an airfield and pushing back opposing forces to provide a safe distance from artillery for the airfield, followed by jungle patrols and offensive sweeps of the island to find remaining Japanese resistance hiding on the island… fighting in jungles and up mountainsides at the same time while also battling… malaria, heat exhaustion, exotic tropical diseases… it was all pretty routine stuff I’m sure… like a Saturday night in Mayville, I suppose.

6 months after arriving on the island the 164th was no longer considered combat ready. The unit had buried too many of its men on the island and the majority of those who survived had lost 20 plus pounds but what they managed to accomplish... was a turning point in the Pacific Theater. As I tried to imagine what the conditions were really like… all I could say to Russ was “Thank You” and I truly meant it. I heard of Russ passing last year and I heard of it too late to attend the funeral. I missed my chance to say goodbye. Today… just might be a good day to find his final resting place and say “Thank You” one more time.


Twins: SP Ervin Santana

1. Eduardo Nunez 3B
2. Brian Dozier 2B
3. Joe Mauer 1B
4. Miguel Sano DH
5. Robbie Grossman LF
6. Oswaldo Arcia RF
7. Eduardo Escobar SS
8. Juan Centeno C
9. Danny Santana CF

A's: SP Graveman

1. Coco Crisp CF
2. Jed Lowrie 2B
3. Stephen Vogt C
4. Danny Valencia 3B
5. Khris Davis LF
6. Billy Butler DH
7. Yonder Alonso 1B
8. Marcus Semien SS
9. Chris Coghlan RF

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[Craig Arko]

Lots of memories there; thank you, Brian.

[Winston Smith]

Thank you Brian well done.

[NoCryingInBaseball]

Don't know about anybody else, but after a four-game winning streak and a series sweep, I'm actually excited for today's game!

[Blake]

Well done, Brian.

[Pardon My Dinger]

Good going, RB. Really good intro.

[Pardon My Dinger]

On that note: how is coco crisp still kickin? He's gotta be 73.

[Blake]

Valencia is hitting 4th for the A's. 

 

I suspect Mr. Valencia (why someone would be named after an orange escapes me. Not only that, nothing rhymes with "orange.") may be out for some payback.

 

Should be an interesting game.

[Blake]

Sox lose!!

[spinowner]

Brian, I'd have given you 5 likes. My dad is a WWII vet, but he was very young and didn't leave the US. He was in training to be a bombardier and almost certainly would have been involved in the invasion of Japan. It's easy to make Memorial Day into a nice 3-day weekend but it's important to remember stories like Russ'.

Edited May 30, 2016 by spinowner

[spinowner]

The ESPN guy said an interesting stat. Sano has the most dingers in MLB since May 11.

[Vanimal46]

The A's really do deserve a better stadium than that concrete jungle they're in.

[spinowner]

 

The A's really do deserve a better stadium than that concrete jungle they're in.

The worst baseball stadium in MLB. Except if you pitch for the A's.

[Vanimal46]

Danny Valencia playing at an "All-Star" level apparently. We don't need him.

[Vanimal46]

Holy cow. Let's hope that's not the direction this ball game goes.

[Pardon My Dinger]

My bad, guys.

[sampleSizeOfOne]

Grandpa was in wwii as well, in the European side of things.

 

I was on the young side to hear stories, and i don't think he was quick to tell many. So i got little to share.

Edited May 30, 2016 by sampleSizeOfOne

[sampleSizeOfOne]

Apparently Crisp broke the tie...

 

It was only a clip-on, so not a big deal.

[spinowner]

 

Grandpa was in wwii as well, in the European side of things.

I was on the young side to hear stories, and i don't think he was quick to tell many. So i got little to share.

I think it's hard to truly understand the undertreated PTSD that WWII vets contended with. I probably would be hesitant to share much as well.

[Vanimal46]

That's comforting that we have the jolly green giant as home plate umpire.

[Vanimal46]

I keep waiting for the drop off from Centeno but the luck continues for him.

[Blake]

 

That's comforting that we have the jolly green giant as home plate umpire.

HO HO HO yeeerrrrrr out?

[Blake]

And yet again, the Twins tie the game after the other team scores.

 

As others have said: Who is this team and what have they done with our Twins?

[Circus Boy]

My dad was a field radio guy in the Marines at Iwo Jima. Our of 21,000 Imperial Japanese troops on the island, fewer than 1,000 were captured. I've got a recording of an interview he did after the battle with Chicago radio station WLS on the troop ship headed back to Hawaii -- where he was to train for an invasion of the main islands that A-bombs made unnecessary -- and he described having to shoot and bayonet Japanese soldiers doing Banzai attacks at night. He was 19.

 

I visited Iwo Jima with a couple hundred veterans of the battle on the 60th anniversary in March 2005. (Dad died in 2002.) Met a lot of fine former Marines and sailors and Navy corpsmen and Seabees. Just about all gone now. Gunny Sgt. R. Lee Ermey came along to do an episode of his show about them.

[jokin]

 

The ESPN guy said an interesting stat. Sano has the most dingers in MLB since May 11.

 

Yep. The Trib boys (especially Reusse) pulled a classic SI Jinx- in reverse- on Sunday (and before). Sano has been getting better and better as the month has progressed, even as the attacks and demands for demotion to AAA continued against him. (Of course, Reusse will probably end up taking credit for Sano's recent power outburst should it continue much longer- Sano has a chance today to match the Twins record of 5 for most consecutive games hitting a home run- Sano's OPS since May11  is 1.045 and his wRC+ is 176)

[Craig Arko]

And yet again, the Twins tie the game after the other team scores.

 

As others have said: Who is this team and what have they done with our Twins?

Maybe they should have been saying that about 'that other team' instead.

[Blake]

If my math is correct, since Grossman joined the Twins, the team is 5-4.

[Craig Arko]

My dad was a field radio guy in the Marines at Iwo Jima. Our of 21,000 Imperial Japanese troops on the island, fewer than 1,000 were captured. I've got a recording of an interview he did after the battle with Chicago radio station WLS on the troop ship headed back to Hawaii -- where he was to train for an invasion of the main islands that A-bombs made unnecessary -- and he described having to shoot and bayonet Japanese soldiers doing Banzai attacks at night. He was 19.

 

I visited Iwo Jima with a couple hundred veterans of the battle on the 60th anniversary in March 2005. (Dad died in 2002.) Met a lot of fine former Marines and sailors and Navy corpsmen and Seabees. Just about all gone now. Gunny Sgt. R. Lee Ermey came along to do an episode of his show about them.

Terrible times. My father was an aerial reconnaissance pilot, and the war ended (thankfully) before he was deployed.

[Blake]

Great play by Dozier. 

[Pardon My Dinger]

This strike zone has been pretty stupid Taking the bat out of left handers' hands.

Edited May 30, 2016 by Pardon My Dinger