MVN - Most Valuable Network

Live blog: Twins and White Sox fight for first place in AL Central

The staff of MLB Outsider blogs live as the Minnesota Twins and Chicago White Sox meet in a one-game playoff to decide the AL Central Division. The winner will meet the Tampa Bay Rays in the first round of the postseason.

The game is televised on TBS and broadcast on ESPN Radio.

Puckett Park sounded better than Target Field

On Monday evening, the Twins and Target reached a 25-year agreement to name the new stadium as Target Field, which is set to open in 2010.

This shouldn’t have been surprising for couple of reasons. Most stadiums and arenas are always named after a corporate name so it’s not shocking that the stadium is after a corporate name. Plus, owners are capitalists so they are going to want money out of their corporate sponsors, and Carl Pohlad is always looking for an extra buck.

The Twins need to find a way to pay for the costs of building a stadium so this was one of the reasons why the Twins took this route.

It makes sense for Target. Target can promote its store to the public especially when

It’s too bad the Pohlads had to resort to that instead of naming the ballpark after an icon. The Pohlads had a good opportunity to make good with the public by naming their park after a player, who has helped them won two championships, in Kirby Puckett. This was a good time to pay a tribute to a dead player.

It just made sense to do this. Puckett made baseball big in Minnesota through his performance and championships. His ability to reach out to young kids and his love for the game was something to like about.

It would have been a great gesture from the Pohlads to go appreciate a player that has done so much for this organization and for the Pohlad family. Pohlad has made his money, and won championships because of Puckett.

It just wasn’t meant to be.

It’s Vikings Season

Tonight, the Minnesota Vikings will start their 2008 campaign against the Green Bay Packers.

The Vikings are the popular team of all the teams in the Twin Cities, and when football season starts, the Vikings get everyone’s attention even if the Twins are in a pennant race. It’s fitting that the Twins are passing the baton to the Vikings right now as far as fan interest goes.

For all intents and purposes, this season is over after the Twins lost the rubber game of a three-game set to the Tigers yesterday afternoon. They suffered a 7-5 loss to the Tigers.

When a team can’t get anything from home cooking, their season is screwed, and that’s the case for the Twins. A team with playoff aspirations can not lose any series at home in September, but the Twins did just that this weekend by losing two straight to the Tigers.

Talk about the Twins being 2 1/2 games out with few weeks to go, but what has the team done to make any Twins fan feel confident? When the bullpen blows leads game after game as we have saw in the last few weeks, it takes a toll on the players, and if this Toronto series did not, this weekend should.

It already has taken a toll on the fans. The booing was out there again, and it seemed like the place was dead all weekend long.

It will be interesting if the Twins will win much in September. It’s hard to believe that they are going to go winless the rest of the way, but the schedule does not get any easier. The Twins have another monster road trip that starts this weekend, and then the White Sox and the Royals finish up the final week of the season.

Right now, Ron Gardenhire needs to use this month as an evaluating period, which means no more using Matt Guerrier, Jesse Crain, Dennys Reyes, and others anymore. Craig Breslow, Philip Humber, Jose Mijares and Bobby Korecky need to get an opportunity to protect leads so that they can warrant a look for next season.

Of course, Gardenhire is not going to do it even if the team is done by next week. He is loyal to the guys that help him win so he will keep trotting out his regular relievers as they continue to embarrass themselves.

It was a good run this year by the boys. This team overachieved in so many ways, and no one can take that away from them.

The Twins should be commended for making it a fun summer. They managed to get back to .500 after the White Sox handed them their lunch in June. They were able to sustain their excellence by beating up on good American League teams after getting fat on National League teams.

Everyone thought the Twins and the White Sox would have an exciting finish to the season, but after what happened in the road trip with the bullpen, the Twins/White Sox series means nothing anymore.

The White Sox will likely finish 10 games ahead of the Twins when all is said and done, and they should be with the talent that they have in that roster. The South Siders have the pieces to be a World Series champion.

At least, the Twins made it an interesting summer to the point that Minnesota fans had something to watch while the Vikings were preparing for the start of the football season.

Now, the stage belongs to the Vikings.

Twins’ losses are like clockwork these days

Scott Baker’s reaction and the boos from the crowd said it all in the eighth inning of the Twins and the Tigers  game at the Metrodome on Saturday afternoon.

When Scott Baker was taken out in the eighth inning with a runner on base, he was not happy about leaving the mound with 1 out. Who can blame him? The bullpen has  been blowing leads since July, and now every reliever on this team stinks.

Baker knew what was coming, and it happened. Dennys Reyes relieved the Twins starter, and he promptly gave up a two-run home run to Curtis Granderson to tie the game up at 4.

Then, the struggling Matt Guerrier gave up a two-run home run to Magglio Ordonez, which gave the Tigers a 6-4 lead.

Game, set, match as the Tigers went on to a 6-4 victory over the home team.

Baker’s face was red in the dugout, and it was probably a wise thing that his teammates stayed away from Baker. It’s rare that he gets angry.

The fans booed, and that’s saying something because Twins fans rarely show their dissatisfaction after losses or blown saves. They know what has been going on with this team, and they don’t like it.

Watching Twins baseball is not a fun experience anymore when the bullpen blows game after game. The feeling is now numb when they do this.

It’s hard to get angry after losses anymore. When all the relievers stink, what can anyone do?

What exactly does it say about this team when half the players and most of the fans expect bad things to happen every night now?  It’s becoming predictable, and that’s not a good thing.

Since August 23rd, the bullpen is 0-7 with a 6.49 ERA. It has allowed 40 hits over those 14 games, and it has blown four saves.

After this latest blown save, let’s end this nonsense that things are going to change now that the Twins are at home. When the relievers stink, they stink no matter where they are pitching, and Saturday should reinforce this theory.

This is looking like a lost cause each passing game, and it will be a matter of time when a hitter or a starter just call out a reliever for screwing up game after game.

When that happens, this is a sign that the team is offically done.