Dave The Dastardly

No Altarations If You Please Okay, I’m going to throw myself at the foot of the High Altar of Analytics and beg for mercy. Well, maybe not “throw” as I might hurt myself. Bad shoulder. Got pitched off a horse once. Besides, I wouldn’t be able to get back up. Two bad knees (football and volleyball). Right ankle, also bad (football, basketball, baseball and basketball again). I could maybe try to pull myself up with my left arm because I’m ambidextrous, but my left wrist, the one I broke about a hundred years ago (football), well… that’s bad too. I guess you could say I’m Anyway, like opposing pitchers, I beg for mercy because although I’ve been a guy who has relied on data my entire life, I have never understood all the statistical formulas behind a lot of the data. In fact I bluffed my way through a couple of college statistics classes by smiling and nodding knowingly despite being completely in the dark. Here’s that formula if any struggling college student out there should feel tempted to duplicate my efforts. (Sm x (NK/D)*(BS*4) = Pass. But even though I don’t understand how the statistics geeks get all their numbers, I can still make those numbers useful. In a way. Thus the hurling (baseball term I thought I’d work in because, you know, this is uh, you know, a baseball site) myself at the foot of the altar. And of course if I hurled at the head of the altar I might wind up clearing the benches and drawing a one-game suspension. And a slap on the fanny, uh, wrist, you savage. Now that I have deliberately muddied the waters, here’s some interesting stats that probably don’t mean (median?) anything about today’s game. “But at least I understand them…” he claimed with a smile and a knowing nod in the now-darkened room. Using a proprietary formula (that means I lost my notes and have no idea how I arrived at anything) for statistical analysis I predict the following regarding today's impending clash of Central Division Titans… Okay, maybe one Titan and one Minotaur, the latter being the mythical beast of which I am most often compared. You know, because the Minotaur was reputed to be half bull. Predictions I Will Claim Only If They Prove To Be Accurate And Disavow As Vehemently As A Straight-Faced Politician If They Prove So Far Off The Mark My Banishment From TD Will Become A Subject Of Discussion Among The Baseball Gods Whose Bowels Move In Mysterious Ways Game Score: Twins: 101 Dalmatians White Sox: 1 Partridge In A Pear Tree Home Runs: Twins: One for every player whose last name begins with a letter. White Sox: What they call the stampede from the locker room when the coldcuts served in the clubhouse were contaminated with Eek-Coli and the stadium toilets are backed up. Pitchers: Twins: an opener for a starter, some middling relief and the last one just before closing. White Sox: None. Going with 99 bottles of beer on the wall instead. Today’s Hurlers Twins: Gib “The Nibbler” Gibson 4-2 ERA 4.47. 51 K Sox: Manny “The Sacrificial Lamb” Banuelos 2-3 ERA 7.26 32K See You tomorrow!

I didn't know that about hot air! Even though I've blown quite a bit of it in my day. Or that about Phoenix. Now the next time my son tries to tell me something about baseball that I don't agree with I can tell him he's high. Who says you can't learn anything on TD?

What? It's the season for tree pollen and sinus infections.

Too optimistic. You forgot to factor in the heavier damp air, the ten degrees lower than normal temps, the "We Should Whip These Guys Syndrome" and the tired arms of Twins hitters. I'd put it closer to 20. But my beer glass is usually half empty.

I had drainage once. Always good to go.

Who's got the fork?

Point Barrow, Alaska (Nuvuk) is the most remote US city. I don't think they have pinball machines there.

Reminds me of my young days when I'd walk in a bar and all the girls would start hitting on me...

To be honest, I spent the best summer of my life when I was a kid riding horses and punching cows on my uncle's place near Norfolk, NE. I was 14 or 15 and my cousin Charlie was a year or two younger. That was damn near 60 years ago and I remember it like it was yesterday. Still get an ache in my shoulder every time the weather changes from the time my horse stepped in a prairie dog hole at a dead run and threw my hindend over tea kettle. Can still smell the cow manure I plowed up... wait, maybe that ain't cow manure I'm smelling!

I see Ohtani is slashing .267/.353/.400/.753 Castro, our Castro for godsakes!, is slashing .246/.370/.656/1.026 Now there's excitement!

Nothing bad ever happened to me in Knoxville. Come to think of it, nothing good ever happened to me in Knoxville either. Knoxville is like Nebraska; a good place to go through.

Whoops! Forgot to divide the team OPS by the price of a stadium beer... Back to the drawing board!

Where did I put that Jameson?

There once was a pitcher named Gibble Who at the corners liked to nibble but when he pitched north and south he struck batters out and about that we didn't quibble

After careful screening of the announced line-ups plus error prone calculation using proprietary formulas cleverly devised by a slightly inebriated quasi-gentleman of German-Irish descent, said calculations further refined by blindfolded dart throwing by the same quasi-gentleman using either hand, I put the over/under for this titanic clash at 4 runs for the Twins. I might be over. But I could be under the coffee table.

Boy, wonder...

I won't guess how many games the Twins will win this year, but I'll bet it will be more than we've seen in a lot of years. Regarding "trades to improve the team" I say forget it. A lot of fans, including a number of TD participants, have complained for years about the perceived lack of team leadership and team chemistry when we were losing more games than we could win. Now we have both team leadership and chemistry. And we're winning games. I say don't screw with it. Don't mess with the magic. If we trade one player, no matter how minor his role may be, or add one player who hasn't been part of what's cooking with these guys so far this season that long-sought "team" chemistry will evaporate like stale beer. Let's keep flowing with those who've been rowing.

Maybe Buxton could be armed with a cattle prod. Then again, Sano will already be in the dugout after trotting off his homeruns.

Perhaps if we adjusted the space-time continuum...

Three words; Bailey's Irish Cream. Three more: Hold the coffee. A last three: Call in sick. Is that a Three, Pete?

I'm a morning person. Too much light in the evening ruins the ambiance.

Anybody remember which US Cavalry general said the Lord gave the Devil a choice between living in Arizona or living in Hell and after checking out the real estate the Devil opted to rent out Arizona and moved to Hell?

I'm not so sure about that. AZ has sucked in a lot of Minnesotans lately. And Indiana... well if you've ever driven down I65 from Indianapolis to Louisville on a hot summer's day you had to wonder if you were going to get a blackhole standing in line at the only wayside rest in the state.

I'll do May 25 or May 26, or both if they're still open.

Interesting comment. Takes me back about fifty years to when I was still dating... struck out a lot if we want to continue the baseball talk.