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Axel Kohagen

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Blog Entries posted by Axel Kohagen

  1. Axel Kohagen
    When you're grown up, there's no reason to hide from the truth. You're not as funny as you think you are. Everyone dies. The universe is cold and hostile. More true than all of these, though, is the following Truth: the Minnesota Twins will lose to the New York Yankees in the first round of the playoffs.
    This series of columns begins with the ending, which is the Minnesota Twins losing to the New York Yankees in the first round of the playoffs. Other bloggers, vloggers, pundits, podcasters, columnists, poets, and novelists pretend to be fair-minded. They will write about the present, which is unknown to us. All we know of the present is that inevitably leads to our team, the Minnesota Twins, losing to the New York Yankees in the first round of the playoffs.
    This column will not be adverse to statistics. Statistics are an excellent way of deconstructing a Twins loss to the Yankees in the first round of the playoffs. Without them, we'd be stuck relying on our gut instincts to explain how swiftly and soundly the New York Yankees beat the Minnesota Twins in the playoffs.
    Some of you prefer to wallow in cynicism.  

    Some of you are incapable of enjoying the lazy summer arc of a baseball season, which always ends with a playoff loss to you-know-who once sweatshirt weather comes around. "Why focus on the negative?" you protest as you set your expectations to "unrealistic."
    A true Twins fan is prepared with a hale and hearty "Better luck next time!" when the asscheeks of the last Yankee on the bench fly from the pine to celebrate in the field. A true Twins fan knows a three game sweep just cleans up the dust from a 182 game season so the hometown nine can rest until next year. 

    I think we'd all like to see the Twins win 117 games in 2020. They will set an MLB record for victories. They will hit 308 home runs. They will strike out 1600 batters. They will prove, without a doubt that they are the best team in baseball and they will be ready, willing, and able to make the Yankees looks even better when they lose to them in their first round of the playoffs.
  2. Axel Kohagen
    Gather round the fire, ye baseball fans. Imagine, if you will, a roaring blaze licking from beneath a tent of shattered bat handles. Listen to the tale I am about to tell, for EVERY word is true.
     
    I tell the tale . . . Of the BASEBALL WEREWOLF!
     
    A baseball werewolf behaves in much the same way as your regular, meat and potatoes werewolf. The moon and the night bring out its power, which is the ONLY possible explanation for why the Twins seem able to score ONLY AFTER THE FIFTH INNING in the last week of so.
     
    How did the power of lycanthropy find our hometown nine? In older times, a person might become a werewolf by donning the fur coat of an evil person or spirit. Unless Bill Belichick left his Ewok-hide duster around after the Super Bowl, this theory seems DEAD ON ARRIVAL. It’s likely a careful fan might notice a Twins player taking the field while wearing a fur coat.
     
    Kent Hrbek playing in a werewolf-fur coat is both likely to happen and a guarantee he will be the league MVP.
     
    Another theory suggests a person can become a werewolf by drinking rain gathered in the footprint of a wolf, so if anyone recently spotted Logan Morrison carrying a LONG STRAW and heading to the zoo’s Minnesota Trail, PLEASE inform this columnist post-haste.
     
    Most likely, a member of the Twins was bitten by a grizzled European character actor. After all, when’s the last time you’ve seen the Twins playing with their SILVER slugger awards?
     
    As long as they keep winning, THIS COLUMNIST will howl at the moonshots for the home team! Even if they don’t score runs until his old buttocks are already abed and asleep!
     
    Now comb your hair and let’s all head to Trader Vic’s!
     
    ⁃ Axel Kohagen of London
     
    (For more serious lunacy, head to www.supertruestories.com and check out my podcast!)
  3. Axel Kohagen
    (Note - it is my hope that we are far enough past the CIRCLE ME BERT CANCELLATION NIGHTMARE that I may impart some TRUTHFUL TRUTHS. If my voice is silenced suddenly, please leave a stick figure drawing of TC Bear in a City Pages on the big glove sculpture. My people will understand.)
     
    Roswell, NM.
     
    An alien spacecraft crashes in the desert. The cover-up begins immediately. Some say it was a WEATHER BALLOON or an EXPERIMENTAL AIRCRAFT. A few even think the whole incident was an ELABORATE DECEPTION from the mind of BILL VEECK!
     
    From the wreckage, a small, spherical object rolled free. Some say that object was a baseball. It moved quickly and avoided detection for around TEN YEARS. A small boy reached out to touch it. Within moments, his arm began to GLOW. Years later, the boy became a man named BB. His otherworldly curveball made him a LEGEND.
     
    When B transitioned to announcing, he wanted to make contact with the aliens whose ENERGIES he encountered as a small boy. In a meeting with his PRODUCTION STAFF and CERTAIN AQUATIC FISHMEN WHO MAINTAIN AN INTEREST IN EARTHEN TECHNOLOGIES, B created a program to place a symbol of the UFO WHO BROUGHT HIS POWERS on the broadcast.
     
    The UFO from underneath.
     
    THE CIRCLE OF BERT!
     
    Why was this NEARLY CANCELLED? There are things I simply CANNOT REVEAL, but an occasional visitor to the stadium has his own relationship to the UFOs, and he has some pretty BIGFEET.
     
    There's not much else I can reveal, except that I have it on GOOD AUTHORITY the aquatic fishmen are not happy with the last ten years or so of Mariners Baseball.
     
    The Truth Is Not Here,
     
    -- Axel Kohagen
  4. Axel Kohagen
    Though the SPINNING WHIRLS OF THE SUPERNATURAL WORLD are often filled with lonely men in black t-shirts, nearly every Twins fan has pondered the UNBEARABLE SUFFERING of LOSING EVERY GAME to the NEW YORK YANKEES!
     
    I hope I can somehow ease the EVERLASTING suffering of the sweet, TC-hatted heads in our community. How many of you have flung pillows at flat-screen televisions, slapped the power knob of a car radio, or politely told the ghost of Yogi Berra his delightful witticisms are not appreciated when your favorite team grounded out for the final out?
     
    My recommendation for the Twins front office? ETERNAL VIGILANCE! All it takes is a Bronx Bomber with mojo on the mind to leave a cursed object somewhere in Target Field. Such an object might be small enough to fit in the palm of your hand, making it seem easier to demolish a building. I have a STRONG SUSPICION the Metrodome was DOOMED FOR DESTRUCTION as a method of exorcising the spirits of FORNICATING BATHROOM REVELERS who chilled visitors with their LOW, GUTTURAL GRUNTING!
     
    And it gets worse. Who knows what they're doing in New York City, which I hear is larger than Duluth and St. Paul COMBINED! They could have a Minnesota hot dish in the stadium, baked with the sweat of Kent Hrbek's cap, left in a freezer to COOL THE BATS of the Twin Cities team. Perhaps a group of INTERDIMENSIONAL MYSTICS from R'LYEH to make each pitch seem bigger than the giant inflatable ball we make children chase to watch them STUMBLE AND FALL! HOW THEY FALL!
     
    It's possible they might have a lot of money, too.
     
    My money is on one Twins fan named Shemp Campbell. Shemp's a farmer from around Austin and he once saw a duck wearing a Yankees hat and he kicked it. Sometimes, that's all it takes. How many of us think before kick our ducks? ESPECIALLY when they're wearing athletic apparel. Makes you think.
     
    But you don't have to think when the Yankees are beating the Twins. AGAIN. You just feel. You feel really badly. You wish the game could be fun again.
     
    Don't kick ducks,
     
    -- Axel Kohagen
  5. Axel Kohagen
    The day after Wednesday - which is the day I publish my evaluation of Twins baseball FROM BEYOND THE EXPERIENCE OF NORMAL BASEBALL MINDS - an epic, significant omen occured. Many have already rushed to offer insight upon this experience, which is a GRAVE MISTAKE! Only the knowledge of a professional supernatural baseball blogger should be considered in situations such as these.
     
    Now, unfortunately, I have no knowledge to add to this experience, but I will continue to type and pontificate anyway, under the assumption that a hefty helping of my SUPERNATURAL MYSTICISM will show the factual reports of this event as what they are.
     
    During the opening ceremony for Twins baseball, an eagle by the name of "Challenger" (I have it on good authority these showbiz eagles rarely use the names they were given at hatching when they perform) FORSOOK the calls of his trainer and, after experiencing some resistance, landed upon the shoulder of Seattle Mariner's starting pitcher James Paxton.
     
    Is this what we call love? I believe not. "Challenger" clearly swats the back of the pitcher on the dismount, as if from one bro to another. Eagles are huge dudebros.
     
    Did this bald-faced wannabe albatross CURSE the pitcher? Only time will tell. I do see he ended the game with a lucky 7 strike outs . . . and a less lucky 7-plus ERA. Perhaps the real curse will not occur until the next FULL MOON, when James Paxton unfurls his feathers as a WERE-EAGLE, flying from pick-up truck to pick-up truck and admiring his likeness in decal form.
     
    Birds are quite often MAGICAL HARBINGERS of major events. Perhaps Challenger represents the snarky Minnesota attitude that DARES ask the question, "COLD ENOUGH FOR YA?"
     
    It is still possible that this bird was simply a big fan of a pitcher named "James Pullman" and, as if often the case, became confused.
     
    WHAT DOES IT ALL MEAN? Fear not - I will watch the signs for you. Perhaps when the EAGLE LANDS UPON THE OPPONENT it signifies a PATRIOTIC GREATNESS is protecting our Twins hopes to win the World Series. And birds ARE the most majestic creatures to routinely crap all over our cars.
     
    Flipping the bird as necessary,
     
    Axel Kohagen
  6. Axel Kohagen
    Some folks will tell you there's a special kind of magic to Opening Day. But ask a stathead to identify exactly what type of magic we're dealing with and the room goes quiet. Is it simply the crack of the bat, the taste of the hot dog, and the lack of parkas?
     
    Surely this magic is there, but there are levels of mysteries in this world. Some of these mysteries can disturb the very foundations of reality, yet when handled with a cool, level hand (such as mine), a baseball fan can learn of NEW WORLDS and contemplate STRANGE MYSTERIES, like the much-whispered about Interplanetary Coalition to Destroy "Circle Me Bert," or ICDCMB.
     
    Today, I have come to teach you about THE MANDELA EFFECT! This phenomenon is named after a series of odd occurrences where people believed Nelson Mandela died well before he actually did. Could this be a simple case of coincidental misrememberings spread across the internet? Perhaps. OR PERHAPS IT IS A SIGN THESE INDIVIDUALS PEERED INTO A DIFFERENT DIMENSION, ONE WHERE MANDELA DID DIE EARLIER!
     
    There's also a lot said about the correct spelling of the Bering Sea Bears books.
     
    But how does this relate to baseball, you ask? This "Mandela Effect" affected me in regards to Opening Day! Somehow, perhaps as I slumbered, I envisioned another dimension where THE MINNESOTA TWINS played their first game on TUESDAY, not THURSDAY! So clear was this vision that I even dressed in a cap and t-shirt to support the home team. I even prepped a meal of HOT DOGS to add to the celebration. Yet, when I turned my attention to the Internet, I discovered the vision was WRONG! My family and I ate a silent meal containing THE HOT DOGS OF SHAME!
     
    Doubtful? Doubt no longer! Just one day later my will was brought into ANOTHER OTHER DIMENSION where I believed the TWINS OPENED THE SEASON AT HOME! I nearly logged onto a ticket-selling website to purchase a ticket before I became aware of my natural dimension.
     
    As a father of a toddler, these experiences HAVE to be related to the Mandela Effect and cannot have any connection to general confusion and exhaustion. Also, I am old.
     
    Why this should happen two times in a short period of time I cannot say. It seems odd the universe would be so disturbed. After all, it seems there is a surplus of kindness and camaraderie these days.
     
    I believe the true magic of Opening Day kept me from getting lost in these alternate timelines. After all, baseball is a magical thing that can bring a group of people together to be happy, except in regards to the umpires and the New York Yankees.
     
    -- Axel Kohagen
    Your Paranormal Baseball Reporter
  7. Axel Kohagen
    This is a TV promo, and this is your last chance to strap yourself in.
     
    Because the next time your favorite team takes the field, the team's ace is going to be taking the mound. The guy on your team people from other states know.
     
    The ace. The guy who can throw fireballs and baseballs that dart about like butterflies and baseballs that start at the batter's eye line and auger ten feet underground.
     
    He's the guy who looks like his giant streetlight poster, and is actually taller than he appears on the Jumbotron.
     
    Every damn time he takes the field he gets a win, a standing ovation, and his own montage of strikeouts on TV. He hauls his team to the playoffs.
     
    Playoffs. He makes them exist.
     
    How long till we have one on OUR side?
  8. Axel Kohagen
    New Line Cinema released a furious preview for their remake of Stephen King's It, and the excitement drove me to pick up my well-worn hardcover of the book to reread it slowly and deliberately. I hope to become so connected with the terrors of Derry, Maine, that I risk waking up to find myself staring at the house on Neibolt Street. Or worse.
     
    Last night, I read something that sparked my imagination. Mike Hanlon, future librarian and member of the heroic Loser's Club, referred to listening to the 1958 Washington Senators. He's right to worry about their performance (the Senators lost 93 games that year), but he's completely unaware those Senators will become the Minnesota Twins in 1961. He's already listening to future Twins greats like Camilo Pascual and Harmon Killebrew.
     
    Clearly, I must take this tiniest bit of trivia and blow it completely out of proportion. Therefore, I proclaim the Minnesota Twins are the official baseball team of Derry, Maine, on the basis of my complete lack of authority.
     
    Most Stephen King creations tend to develop ties with the Boston Red Sox, but this is Twins time. Big Steve owes us for David Ortiz, right?
     
    The movie is expected to come out in September, which leaves plenty of time to establish Derry Daze at Target Field. The organist can play jaunty circus music. Pennywise the Dancing Clown can throw out an orange pom-pom as the first pitch. And every fan gets a balloon. They'll be environmentally safe, but you can bet that EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THOSE BALLOONS WILL FLOOOOOOOOOAT!
     
    If needed, I would volunteer to dress up as Pennywise. I'd even sit behind the opposing team's dugout and scream "BEEP-BEEP!" any time they try to talk.
     
    It's the least I can do.
     
    Axel
  9. Axel Kohagen
    Whether I watch the Twins on the television, listen on the radio, or follow along with Gameday on my phone, I can assure you I am doing my part. Yet, somehow, this team is failing.
     
    When Twins players stand in the batter's box, I say "Home Run." I mean, I actually say the words out loud. And I nod once, with my chin in the air, to let that player know I am as sincere as Linus van Pelt singing praise in the pumpkin patch.
     
    The crappy thing is they aren't hitting them when I say they should. It forces me to live in an empty baseball world where the path to first base is covered in chalk and bitter existential ennui. At some special time, I'm demand to scream "called it" -- as is my birthright as a homer fan.
     
    I'm calling victories for pitchers, too. I do this in an even more elaborate way, explaining which pitch will earn the strike-out or how the next pitch will drop two runners with some 6-4-3 magic. Then, as you might expect, those home runs show up and the other team's players prance around the bases like some ancient black and white cartoon.
     
    Clearly, you other fans deserve more. I will not let you down. I will enunciate, in case our hometown nine think "home run" really means "strike out looking . . . again!" I will simplify the cheers I make for our pitchers to a very clear, if inelegant, "please make the man with the bat go back and sit down in his dugout with sadness and zero runs."
     
    If it's not me, gang? Then the failure could be back, And you can't cheer your way out of the failure. We'll all spend twice as much on food, but we'll be eating it at home because it's too sad to see the failure in person.
     
    So blame me, because none of us can take another season like we usually get.
  10. Axel Kohagen
    The Twins are coming home 6-3, and with the seasons we've suffered through they might as well all strut onto Target Field wearing uniforms designed to mimic John Travolta's white suit from Saturday Night Fever. They should have a "Pinch 'n Slap" booth at each entrance to help fans confirm they are not dreaming. Ice cream in mini batting helmets should come with six cherries on top.
     
    But we're all gonna talk about losing that series to Detroit, and we're especially going to talk about Byron Buxton striking out like he was trying to take Sally Field's Oscar from Norma Rae.
     
    -- Is there any actual strike in that movie? If not, I'm just counting on the fact that Twins Daily readers like me - they REALLY like me! That should get me past the facts.
     
    The dread moments of baseball aren't reserved for when your team loses a number of games that would be good to score on the wheel in The Price is Right. Dread's the bitter coffee you have while watching a beautiful sunset. It's the bowel movement caused by that coffee when you sit on your throne and watch videos of another Sano home run. Dread may be a little gross and personal, but we always put it on the menu.
     
    By the end of August, every goldurn one of you will have a player you can't stand. And you will follow this player more closely than the players you like. You'll pray for them to get demoted, traded, or even forced into real estate. When one of those outcomes happens, you'll cheer and splatter ink praising the end of the great awfulness all over your social media. Then, before your head hits the pillow, your brain will seize the next player you'll hate by one ankle and begin brewing barrels of spite.
     
    I think this happens because we all really believe we're just a bend in the road away from true happiness, and we could fix it if someone just gave us the chance. Proving we can fix the destiny of our favorite baseball team reinforces the idea we'd be living like princes and princesses if the damned bastards of the world would just listen to us.
     
    For me, life would be fine and dandy if the White Sox went away and Trevor May got healed by Roma Downey in Touched by an Angel (or some retro Michael Landon miracle-making). Will this amount to anything? Well, Brendan Harris isn't going into the Twins' Hall of Fame any time soon. But the human animal I am can't just watch the game without grounding my teeth and dreading the unholy idea that no one cares what I think.
  11. Axel Kohagen
    It's opening day and I'm wearing my Joe Nathan shirt for the tenth year in the row. The Twins are playing the Royals, because the Twins are ALWAYS playing the Royals. Advanced statistics will confirm the Twins play 127% of their games against the Royals, and 75% of those games mean nothing to anybody anyway. But we sure play them, now knowing that all of us can go to Hy-Vee afterwards.
     
    A guy named Duffy is taking the mound for the Royals, which kind of pissing me off. I don't know Duffy, and I have no desire to expend any effort to find two facts I can string together that make it look like I cared.
     
    Our Minnesota Twins lost over 100 games last year and, on their first battle of 2017, a pitcher with a name sounding like pure aw-shucks happiness is going to be come trotting on to the field. Couldn't we have found a team with a pitcher named "Grimm-Reeper" or "Rebuilding-Year?"
     
    I know, everybody's in first place now. Groovy. It was a short weekend and I still remember trying to have meaningful discussions about the team's future while they circled the bases in reverse, like the were slugging runners round the rim of a toilet bowl.
     
    Don't get me wrong, I'm not insulting the players who put in the work and try their best and are probably more frustrated than the average fan can imagine. I just have to spell out my feels because I know some of you out there will pick up what I'm putting down. I love the Twins like I love air and water, but I can't just forget 2016. If my wife had a sexy affair with a guy dressed like my arch-nemesis Sweetums, from the Muppets . . . we would try to work through it. But I would insist on having her deloused and I would leave the house and burn it if I saw one brown muppet hair.
     
    Soon, those blue-billed Royals will emerge from the secret tunnels between their stadium and the Twins, tipping their Morlock bus driver as they exist. It will be the first of 1000 games between these two teams, before the All-Star break. Next, Twins fans will arrive.
     
    "I want to see a double!" a small child will say, and everyone will understand. We love our team to death, but bruised hearts start slow.
     
    -Axel Kohagen
  12. Axel Kohagen
    I spent my Tuesday night at Target Field because of a coupon and the Pittsburgh Pirates. The Pirates are the team I root for in that other league, and the ticket cost next to nothing after I applied the coupon. Since this coupon paid for one single ticket, I went without a spouse or a sidekick.
     
    Once I knew my novel Orphans (with Roy C; Booth} would be published on July 21st, this lonesome visit to Target Field took on added importance for me. The book takes three lonely, crumbling men and haunts them past their breaking points. I doubted the Twins would break me, even if they did lose like they had the last time I saw them play (and they did). I just wondered if you could still be a lonely grump in a twenty-first century ballpark, and if you could get lost in your thoughts instead of your smart phone.
     
    The first four innings went smoothly, and I spent them in my seat in the 300s. Later, I discovered I sat in front of some old friends from an old job, but I missed them by diving into a mixture of thoughts, texts, and temptations to be hopeful about Pelfrey's outing. He kept the game in line and the offense put two runs on the scoreboard in his support. I might have kept watching from the skies if my stomach had shut up.
     
    I left the stands and found myself watching the Target Field organist work. Even though the interior of the pub feels like a place where bartenders where garters on their sleeves, nothing here was lonely. In fact, the organist herself smiled as she glanced over the room, somehow finding time to chat with fans, watch the game, and play her tunes when the right time came. The smiling drinkers around me convinced me I was two minutes away from a friendly conversation, so I escaped to continue my quest to be the lonely wanderer of Target Field.
     
    I found more space out by left field, but the standing view wasn't quite to my liking so I moved down to the second level. Just one level down, the wandering was far more social. Small squads of princesses from various hometown contests milled about, taking pictures. You could spot them by their sashes and matching shoes. Adults wandered the same pathways and smaller children darted between princesses and adults, like sand between pebbles and rocks.
     
    I couldn't stay disconnected from the blue-and-red mob. The Twins were handing back runs as I watched from railings. I followed the game from the crowd noise, and I smiled at other fans. The wind picked up and blew a hat and rack of chips on the floor, and everyone shared a chuckle. I watched a challenged play at the plate from an awkward third base angle. Another wandering guy watched next to me and together we agreed the runner was out just moments before the umpires concluded the exact opposite. The guy walked away. Actually, I think someone he belonged to came to claim him.
     
    I wandered the main level on my stomach, desperate to find the perfect food and settling for some standby nachos. I stood on the concourse by the flags, a place where I always feel comfortable in the shadow of a Jim Thome home run. I found a spot next to a man who cheered like a bad audition for professional wrestling. A flurry of hits drove the Twins down by four runs.
     
    Truth be told, I escaped to my car after the inning finally ended. I cheered along on the radio as the Twins brought in the runs to tie the game, and I cringed when they gave up the lead and lost the game. My blood still runs through blue and red veins, but my mind and body felt like enjoying some solitude.
     
    A day later, still covered in wreckage from today's Twins loss, it occurs to me this is something of a miracle. Target Field may actually be timeless, and this may be the proof. It survives smart phones, bright lights, instant scoreboard updates, cable, and wifi. With National Night approaching, it seems worth noting going to a baseball game was so friendly I couldn't be a cranky bastard when I tried my best. With a week full of especially crappy news, there must be some value in this discovery. It appears the men of my novel could've done more to save their own souls.
  13. Axel Kohagen
    (Note: After regularly commenting on the 2013 Twins season, I stayed away from the blog while I put life's little bits together into something that resembled the picture on the puzzle box. Now, with Roy C. Booth and my novel Orphans published and ready to scare everyone senselessly, I finally have time to return to overthinking the odds and ends of Twins baseball. I will be attending four games this week and writing an essay about all of them.)
     
    After I learned about baseball, I can remember a moment where I considered the possibility of a never-ending baseball game. Younger then, I always assumed all of the fans would stay for every pitch. Job absences would be forgiven by authority of baseball. Children and pets would move to different houses. The game would play on, sometimes with matched innings of big scoring, mostly with zeroes filling up the scoreboard.
     
    I remembered this at the Twins game last night, when the New York team -- mostly Alex Rodriguez -- placed the game perilously close to the spiral of a dance with infinity in the extra innings. I should have worried more about a total collapse and another painful, pin-striped gut punch.
     
    Maybe it was because we were playing the Yankees, but thinking about a game played without time limits made me think of the timelessness of the game itself. We baseball romantics love to think of the game as being a neatly preserved time capsule from over a century ago. Is it still so romantic when a clock keeps both teams from wasting precious time and the man destroying your team at the plate may have benefitted from scienctific discoveries unheard of a hundred years ago?
     
    Are the people in the stands the same people, or just a similar type of people? I watched an older man having trouble finding his way back to his seat. I saw couples on dates ignoring each other to check in with other people on their smart phones. I saw players on both teams making enough money that their entire famlies would never work again, while their past counterparts needed employment between seasons. We all judged each other's T-shirt slogans.
     
    Twins fans came as cultural refugees on a glorious July night, to hide in a game we can at least pretend is pure from the taint of decades of upsetting and frightening change - however we personally define upsetting. The runners keep going around the bases and we can pretend we aren't still outraged about the thing that just happened to our country.
     
    Except we're still checking our social media to make sure our side is still winning. In fact, if we eavesdrop, we can hear someone saying the exact same things we blocked three people to avoid reading last week. We could text someone official for help silencing them, but how timeless would that be?
     
    In times like these, even the Yankees don't seem like miserable wretches. Except Alex Rodriguez still does, because he hit three home runs against the hometown heroes and such things are timelessly deplorable.
     
    -- Axel
  14. Axel Kohagen
    Whiffle ball led off my failed experiment at playing baseball. We owned two thin yellow whiffle ball bats and two big fat red bats. We hacked away with the yellow bats and eventually, after spinning around on strikeout after strikeout, someone would stomp into the garage and grab Big Red. It was the only way we could get a hit.
     
    This was country ball. There were never many of us, so pitcher's hand rules went into effect. Bases were usually leaves, sticks, or scratched out portions of dust. Games ended when it became more fun to smack each other with the bats than wait for the pitch to sail over the plate, or when a whiffle ball got lost in itch weed and no one's parent was willing to drive into town to buy a new one with change left over from buying candy. I swung for the fences every time and, despite the law of averages, I'm pretty sure I lost every time we played.
     
    Little League changed things, in that my failures were on display for classmates and their parents. I played right field and discovered prayer could not keep someone from hitting a ball out for me to misplay and lose in the grass.
     
    I prayed for the batter in front of me to record the last out, hoping the team would be outscored enough I would not be asked to bat at the top of the next inning. I notched one hit when I swung so far in advance of a pitch the bat wrapped around my body and the ball accidentally ran into the meat of the bat hanging over the plate. The ball trickled fair and I somehow landed on base.
     
    The other highlight of Little League brought short-lived joy. I cleverly worked my way out of a run-down between third and home, but the parents were laughing as I crossed home plate. Later, someone told me I'd accidentally kicked the ball out of the catcher's hand with my flailing and the run did not count, anyway.
     
    Scared of the ball? Terrified. I saw a classmate almost castrate his cousin with a lined shot that went past left field and nearly into a basketball court across the park. Catch could bloody your nose. I saw my coach scream in pain when a baseball bounced off his skull after I threw it when he was not looking.
     
    I kept going out, year after year, until junior high. It seemed manlier to announce that "baseball is stupid" instead of admitting I could not grasp the focus, communication, and teamwork necessary to play the game. I spent all of my energies swinging a bat spastically at my problems instead of learning and enjoying one hell of a game.
     
    Baseball tortured me through adolescence, only to provide me with enough joy and friendship to more than even the scales in adulthood. The game did not change, but I finally relaxed enough to join the team and find the right pace and attitude.
     
    As busy as life feels for kids today, I hope they are not hurrying so fast they miss baseball, too.
  15. Axel Kohagen
    Baseball returns, and the internet trembles.
     
    The devout among us spend our days filling our brains with bucketfuls of thoughts. When presented with a keyboard, we pour these thoughts into various molds and send them out into the world.
     
    We find others who agree with our world views and we build ideas about why the ball moves the way it does. We create grids. We build structure. We invent games to prove we understand baseball better than baseball does.
     
    We think we own this game that has lived for over a century.
     
    Truth is, beneath the metal girders of our baseball constructions, the game itself grows organically. It grew as this country grew, and it spread through a war that could have killed our nation.
     
    Baseball pretends to submit to our designs, but it grows and changes anyway.
     
    This year, as we analyze the game and play along at home, the game will continue changing it to whatever it will be for the next generation. Seeds sprout now. They do not fit into the current framework, so it can be tempting to ignore them.
     
    Baseball is alive, and we are given another glorious season to watch it grow.
     
    Before long, our current conversations will be as obsolete and out of touch as the conversations the generations before us had. We will take our words and ideas and we will fade away.
     
    Baseball, however, will still be played, and will celebrate yet another opening day.
     
    Think about that, but when you are done thinking, play ball!
  16. Axel Kohagen
    "Then the boy saw all— Since he was old enough to know, big boy
    Doing a man’s work, though a child at heart—" - Robert Frost
     
    Got the Sano news via phone notification as I got out of bed, and the grayness hung in the air like it saw this one coming.
     
    Flesh fails us all, but it is not supposed to crap out on a young physical wonder standing in the wings, moments away from his MLB debut. In January, Sano drew long lines of fans at Twinsfest. Now he begins a long road toward rebuilding his body, and I wish him nothing but the best.
     
    Athletes grow into tremendous physical gifts, but the flesh plays by its own rules. It must be a helluva kidney punch when an up-and-coming slugger realizes he is captain of an odd collection of fleshy bits, quite capable of mutiny. Eat right, exercise . . . and maybe something congenital gets you anyway.
     
    I want Sano to be bulletproof because Lord knows I'm not. I am past skipping the doctor and into an age where the doc has a usual list of things to watch out for. Believing in slo-mo swings for the bleachers under calm blue skies makes me feel like a body could live forever.
     
    But it cannot.
     
    I wonder if Sano, just entering his twenties, realizes his personal pain triggers sadness in the older fans, who want him to be young and amazing as a surrogate. Most likely he is simply concerned with healing and living his life, as he should be.
     
    And we, who are not the future baseball, must get on with our lives as fans who still need the dream.
  17. Axel Kohagen
    Just bought my 2014 Twins Daily Offseason Handbook, and I started thinking my baseball thriller The Hoosecows, written with Roy C. Booth, is a prospect to watch in its own right.
     
    If you're a Twins fan, the joy of watching prospects mature is going to be a big part of your 2014 experience. Sano, Buxton, Meyer . . . What could be more exciting than supporting a future superstar before they slip into a big league uniform?
     
    Now, I'd like to offer you a chance to dial into another prospect. The Hoosecows is a baseball thriller about an independent league baseball team slogging through a season of suffering. Mysteries develop. Games get violent. Ballplayers meet untimely ends. It's a heckuva story, and Roy C. Booth and I will finish the final revision soon.
     
    This means The Hoosecows is a prospect, too. It will audition for publishers and we think you'll want a copy when it goes pro.
     
    But then you'd miss the fun of following the prospect process. Like us at http://www.facebook.com/cfcows. Get all the updates. Just by liking the page, you pump up our stats for the publishing scouts, too!
     
    That way, when someone you know buys a copy of the finished novel, you can say "I followed that book in the minor leagues."
     
    -- Axel
  18. Axel Kohagen
    Headaches, Old and New (Twins 5 Indians 6 - Game 159)
     
    A busy day ended with a headache and an early trip to bed, like I was a starting pitcher getting the hook.
     
    It occurred to me, annoyed by pain as I was, that I might be lucking out. After all, I had a reason not to pay attention to baseball.
     
    Grinding out the last few months of recaps has reminded me baseball really only has a few stories. The dominating conquerors. The wily Cinderellas. The damned losers.
     
    I feel like the Twins haven't lost enough to be interesting failures this year. There may not be a tale to tell this time.
    Monstrosities (Twins 6 Indians 12 - Game 160)
     
    I only had one day at Crypticon, the yearly horror convention where I get autographs from fiendish monsters and the heroes who outlast their onslaughts. This year meant autographs from regally evil Sybil Danning, most fearless chainsaw-fighting hero Caroline Williams, and monster man Derek Mears. Got an autograph from local scream queen Sarah French, who once talked to me about visiting "Moonlight" Graham's grave in Rochester after I told her I co-wrote a baseball horror novel.
     
    It's like Twins Fest, but with shorter lines and more blood. You can get bobbleheads there.
     
    I checked the score of the Twins game, and clearly no one minds kicking this team when they're down. These games are forgotten as soon as they're entered into scoresheets.
     
    Three Years in Mudville (Twins 1 Indians 5 - Game 161)
     
    MLB moved this game up for the Indians, who set up and knocked 'em down. Rainy day, too.
     
    I'd hate for this nihilist attitude to come across as hateful to the players. The boys with the bats are clearly still playing. Time, though, it's moved on. Future books about the team will include this season in a short chapter with tiny paragraphs.
     
    Winning isn't everything, and it may be the only thing . . . that weaves you into history.
     
    No Joy (Twins 1 Indians 5 - Game 162)
     
    Twins lost. It's over for this year.
     
    When Stewart O'Nan and Stephen King wrote about the Red Sox, the Boston team won the World Series. Logically, I knew the Twins weren't really going to do that, no matter how much of a fan boy I can be.
     
    I wanted to see if you could write a story about a team doing nothing, and becoming nothing, for the third year in a row. I wanted to do it without being bratty or accusatory. I wanted to find nobility in a broken-down season.
     
    I tried. I failed, too.
     
    Instead, I wrote about my life in Mudville, after Casey whiffed on the last pitch of the ninth. There was no joy in it for me, of course.
     
    In truth, I am a kneejerk fan who waits for the victories and mutters his way through the losses. And I don't blame myself. Sports provide me with the dramatic joy living real life doesn't always provide.
     
    I love the Minnesota Twins, and I wish them a great off-season of putting the pieces together. But the fat lady sings in operas, Twins fans, and I won't be screaming in delirious happiness until this baseball team makes a big, bold splash into the post season.
     
    Because I am an unapologetic fan. And this is what fans are for.
  19. Axel Kohagen
    Look Upon Mauer and Tremble (Twins 4 Tigers 3-- Game 156)
     
    Mauer's out for the season, like we all knew he would be. Concussion City gains a new resident. And this Pinto kid seems like he's ready to play some catcher. People wonder if Mauer can come back to put on the tools of ignorance. People wonder if Mauer can come back at all.
     
    The M and M boys are gone, leaving Target Field empty like a Halloween candy bowl. Mauer seems likely to be back in some way, shape, or form. Morneau's probably gone for good.
     
    I'm not a lifer Twins fan - I got hooked in '06, and now I'm realizing the team I came to the party with is gone for good. A new team is coming together even as we speak, but I'm bummed for what could've been.
     
    Putting Away Leisure (Twins 2 Tigers 4-- Game 157)
     
    The postseason is coming, but not to our fair city. I'm trying to adjust to life without conversations based on the foundation of "How 'bout those Twins?"
     
    This is extra unfair for Northern folk. Our winters last for half a year, and leave us trapped in sealed houses with the same people for months at a time. If ever a little light baseball talk would be appreciated, it's around February first.
     
    Of course, maybe the Twins will have a lively offseason to keep us gossiping.
     
    Maybe?
     
    Without baseball, there are whole relationships rendered mute until spring training. Water coolers will go silent. Fathers and sons will be left with only jokes based on bodily functions.
    Out, Out, Out (Twins 0 Tigers 1-- Game 158)
     
    Everything is changing. Gatsby of Twins Bloggers Aaron Gleeman is openly tweeting about going to Target Field on a date instead of staying home ranking Official Fantasy Girls of AaronGleeman.com. It's a new world out there.
     
    Only one series to go in these recaps, and I wonder what other people are getting out of it. If you followed from the beginning, you witnessed me stifling my fan boy optimism until reality took that away one piece at a time.
     
    The Twins playing miserable baseball wouldn't even crack my year's top ten list for pain and disappointment, but it's easily in the top three on the list of things I keep whining about. I get the feeling there are more fans out there like me, and I bet we all look at each other and think "that dude's too obsessed."
  20. Axel Kohagen
    Memory Lane Trips (Twins 6 As 8 -- Game 152)
     
    In 2006, I watched Boof Bonser take the mound against the Oakland As. I was close to Torii Hunter when he tripped up and misplayed a ball. I watched a good season end.
     
    Now the As are looking pretty good and the Twins are collapsing their way to 90+ losses. Again. Third time in a row.
     
    Nighttime is getting dark, and these games are just little tombstones in a season so forgettable you couldn't describe it by mentioning proud moments from actual games.
    No-Town (Twins 0 As 11 -- Game 153)
     
    I've gone from being a Good Fan to being a Bad Fan to being an Evil Fan. When the runs start to line up against us, I say bring it on. It's been a run-down carnival midway of a season, so why not just send in the clowns?
     
    Losing gets repetitive, and real life follows suit. Concerns about U.S. involvement in the Middle East, two party politics becoming absurd, weather not being what you wanted? We've all been here before.
     
    When I read other Twins bloggers and reporters, I wonder if they're as desperate to be finished with this season as I am.
    Raw Sewage (Twins 1 As 9 -- Game 154)
     
    The As stadium, charming as it is, overflowed with what could potentially have been raw sewage. This delayed the game, and loaded up Twins writers everywhere with an apt but obvious metaphor for the season. But that wasn't enough for this team, so they lost 9-1 just to prove the point.
     
    Playoff baseball is coming. I'm still hitching my wagon to the Pirates, even if they've had a few sewage filled moments of their own lately. When I turn on that first playoff game, baseball will seem like a different sport. I'm not used to the games meaning something.
    Home Fan Advantages (Twins 7 As 11 -- Game 155)
     
    Twins lose again, but the Minnesota Vikings pitched in to lose in a more humiliating fashion. I watched the football team lose in person, then got updates on the Twins loss as an after dinner mint.
     
    A visit to the Metrodome is a great way to avoid getting too nostalgic about the Twins' time in the Metrodome. The bathroom lines are so long you don't stand in them, you enroll. The drab, circular hallways are like being trapped in a never-ending high school hallway. Even the air feels bored.
     
    Win or lose - and yup, Twins lost again - Target Field is a heckuva place to be. The food and beer still tastes pretty darned good. The sightlines are amazing. The spaces are comfortable.
     
    It's like an empty Twinkie, missing it's baseball cream filling. It deserves something special next year.
  21. Axel Kohagen
    Cool Breeze, Eyes Closed (Twins 1 White Sox 12 - Game 149)
     
    After getting our house Halloween ready the night before, I came home to a perfectly decorated house. The smell of fall blew through the windows and hung in the air.
     
    It covered the stench of what Liam Hendriks was doing on the mound in Chicago. The Great Dane agreed with me.
     
    If anyone's excited to see the Twins lose, it's Stella the Great Dane. She was traumatized when I jumped up and stomped around the living room after Kubel won the game with a cycle-completing home run. She was mortified when Liriano got the no-no and I picked her up and spun her in a circle.
     
    Crisp fall weather is great for Great Danes, but a boring season for the Twins is pretty good, too.
     
    The Mermaids Aren't Singing (Twins 3 White Sox 4 - Game 150)
     
    When I drove past Target Field tonight, I knew I was done going to games for the year. The thought didn't smack me across the face, but it did sour in my gut.
     
    Two games at Target Field. The fewest number of games I've attended in years. If we're tallying the stats, I haven't bought a Twins shirt this year, either.
     
    I'm a fool with my money, but the Twins aren't getting into my pocketbook like they used to. Either I'm growing up or they're losing their touch.
     
    Twins lost again, as if defying me to care.
     
    Daydream Disbelief (Twins 4 White Sox 3 - Game 151)
    The game came and went with a victory while my wife and I were negotiating doctor time.
     
    It's funny how no one complains about stat-heads in medicine. In fact, doctors really are better off keeping their gut instincts to themselves. We may want them to be brave and occasionally take chances, but we need them grounded in reality.
     
    Today, I kept wondering what it'd be like if our doctor was a soured baseball scout or embittered baseball writer. Don't think I'd like it.
     
    Glen Perkins saved yet another game, by the way. Right now, he's his own winning season.
  22. Axel Kohagen
    Voorhees: A True Dynasty (Twins 0 Rays 3-- Game 146)
     
    On this Friday the 13th, I regret choosing Friday the 13th Part VIII - Jason Takes Manhattan as the film I watched. Jason Voorhees may be unkillable, but this lame hodge-podge of maritime hijinks and flimsy backstories sure signaled a sign this franchise had seen better days.
     
    The Twins, another franchise that's seen better days, got blanked. If I had cable, I'd have been just as bored watching them as I was watching a guy in a hockey mask jump out from behind boxes.
     
    If you want to continue the analogy, the Jason movie's failure might best be attributed to apathy from the higher ups and low budgets. Do what that what you will.
    Mother Nature, Human Nature and Losing, Which is Second Nature (Twins 0 Rays 7-- Game 147)
     
    The Internet Twins Crew put together a Grand Drunk Railroad Pub Crawl. I didn't go (diagnosed as cheap), but I like to think of them as a rag-tag crew daring to love the Twins in spite of everything.
     
    Unfortunately for them, "everything" includes Nature. The day spit on them for daring to love a suffering team, and then it put its foot down to actually stop the game for hours. Things let up just so the gang could watch the hometown nine lose.
     
    All they ever dared do was enjoy a lousy team in a losing season (with booze). Nature will have none of that. It's fall now, and all the loose leafs must be shaken from the tree.
     
    Glen Perkins found the only way he could to get a save for the evening, and he bought a round for the revelers from the bullpen. His gesture will live on for years, for a relatively small cost. The team brass could take notes, if they so chose.
     
    Halloween Creep (Twins 6 Rays 4-- Game 146)
     
    With fall comes football, and then all roads lead to Halloween.
     
    I put my decorations out on September 15th, so my favorite holiday can have the same amount of celebrating as Christmas. Santa and his posse cheat their way up to the day after Thanksgiving, so I just push my hauntings back to September.
     
    Amidst this massive endeavor the Twins won a game with Josmil Pinto and my main man Ryan Doumit crushing homers. Perkins earned yet another save.
     
    Still, at one point in the day I took down a Twins banner to put up a ratty wooden skeleton. That's what Fall does to most baseball teams. When my guys win their way into October, I'll be happy to mix red and blue into my orange and black. This year? The skeleton owns that piece of real estate.
  23. Axel Kohagen
    A Pop-In (Twins 6 Angels 3 - Game 142)
     
    Make-up games fit perfectly into Minnesotan living. If we're not winterizing something we're complaining about the electric bill from running the AC. We're always paying down the interest on past due weather expenses, so our baseball team might as well, too.
     
    Amidst summer's last hissy fit, the Twins came to play. They won 6-3 and kept Glen Perkins' status as The Last Twin With Something To Smile About intact.
     
    Pinto seems kinda nifty, and Presley has me thinking there might've been some sense behind the Morneau trade. Meanwhile, Justin and Frankie L. are celebrating a season where Pittsburgh, for the first time in so long, won't have a losing season.
     
    Back home, in the land of 10,000 lakes, we would do well to avoid recognizing that all losing streaks start with small numbers, and this will be our third losing season in a row.
  24. Axel Kohagen
    The Mob Has Tweeted (Twins 5 Blue Jays 6 - Game 139)
    This game paired up two pitchers I knew, in my gut, were going to become amazing. R.A. Dickey rose to the challenge. Mike Pelfrey must not have gotten that memo.
     
    When your favorite team will only win prizes for participation, the only excitement left comes in sifting through the wreckage to find future stars.
     
    We all know how this game works, even if we pretty it up with BS from time to time. You pick a player you believe is going to turn heads in 2014 and you proclaim their ascendency often, and in public.
     
    Then, you wait. If the player biffs it, you take the hit. If not, you get to proclaim your baseball genius. Loudly. And in public.
     
    I'm not trying to act superior here. My money's on Arcia.
     
    All Snark on Deck (Twins 2 Blue Jays 11 - Game 140)
     
    Aaron Gleeman made it to the deckstravaganza, but only barely. He had to strategize a path to the promised lands, jabbing with his Twitter account like it was the sweet science of boxing. With skill and clout, he made it to rooftop to watch the game and play with his phone (this can be proven with documented photographic evidence).
     
    Gleeman rounded out the night by taking a picture with a fan, and he barely got into the deckstravaganza. Gleeman walks among the internet-dwelling baseball fans like a Prohibition-era gangster, and he barely got in.
     
    I don't know, I'm starting to think I didn't make it because I didn't submit an application.
     
    I'm not sure why Gleeman wasn't a given to the deskstravaganza, but I'd hate to be the person in charge of inviting us bloggy types a little closer to the action. After all, a lot of us have opinions, attitudes, and no qualms about being very public about anything and everything. In short, many of us are maniacs - and I dig it. A blogger with access loses a little bit of vinegar and a whole lot of piss.
     
    The game the deckstravaganza crowd watched? 11-2 blowout. Can't win some days . . .
     
    Hank Williams Jr. Interrupts this Message (Twins 0 Blue Jays 2 - Game 141)
     
     
    Some Twitter folks were very proud to proclaim they were watching another loss instead of getting ready for some football. I wish them well, but I turned on network TV and got disappointed by a completely different Minnesotan team.
     
    Just the night before, a friend of mine and I were lamenting the joyous, lively baseball conversations that lit up the internet when the Twins were winning. Now those friends are all turning to the Vikings, and it feels like hope and joy are endangered species back in the 'dome, too. Maybe the Vikings weren't ready for some football.
     
    Maybe it really is Vince Lombardi's world, and winning is everything - even for the folks who aren't playing the game.
  25. Axel Kohagen
    Chuckles (Twins 10 Astros 6 Game 136)
     
    Other places it was Labor Day and the last day of the fair, but in our house it was preparation day. The next day my wife was due at the hospital for a thyroidectomy. She's fine, and she's going to be fine. It's just another annoying grown-up thing that reminds a person real life always wins.
     
    We stayed busy preparing for our trip to the hospital, and the game itself didn't get much attention.
     
    Still, when I heard about Colabello's grand slam in the ninth, I had to chuckle . In spite of all the stress and worry, knowing something magical and uncommon happened for my favorite team made me smirk to myself in an emotionally draining moment.
     
    Thank you, Chris Colabello, for that.
     
    Territorial Pride (Twins 9 Astros 6 -- Game 137)
     
    The team won this game on the road, but its fans won the day for our family at home.
     
    I've had the pleasure of meeting with many other Twins fans online, and several of them are friends who have met me at games, shared a meal with me, or even been in my house (after my wife was certain the house was cleaned to her standards). Finding friends gets harder with age, and for me spotting a person with a TC hat and an attitude is a great sign I'm meeting a person I'm going to like.
     
    As my wife cruised through her surgery like a champ and took to her recovery with the ferocity and dedication of Adrian Peterson, I realized how many great friends we had made through Twins-related activities. Many of those friends have been there for us during this stressful time, providing us with smiles and support.
     
    It's a heckuva thing to know a simple game of strategy can bring together a community of giving hearts. Twins fans out there who have reached out and given time and compassion, we thank you heartily. You know who you are, and we won't forget.
     
    I may be biased, but I believe baseball fans are the best people to know. Thanks, everyone, for proving me right.
     
    Off Day A-Hoy! (Twins 5 Astros 6 -- Game 138)
     
    Caught bits and pieces of this game on the radio and my phone as we got permission to take my wife home for some rest, relaxation, and high-quality husband care. Everything felt a little topsy-turvy, but it looked like the Twins might get me grinning with a series sweep - I always love those.
     
    It came close, but it didn't happen. I was already napping before the game was over, getting to some off day battery recharging a little ahead of my favorite baseball team. My wife's spirit is coming back, and we're hoping our own personal bounceback season is finished and we can return to our championship form soon.
     
    Oh, and because I am still the creepy guy? Anyone look at the Astros' scores for the last three games? 6. 6. 6. We should keep an eye on that, guys.
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