Twins at Cleveland. Cleveland 8, Twins 2.

'Twas an odd night for Batgirl, flipping back and forth between the Olympic opening ceremony and the Twins game. Actually, since said ceremony started an hour into the Twins game, after our guys were already down 6-1, there was much more flipping forth than back.

I don't know which was worse, watching Katie Couric pretending she knew something about Greek culture while alternating between a hushed gravitas for all the, you know, history, and the giggly dippiness she lends yearly to the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade, or watching Carlos Silva give up five runs in the first inning. Actually, I do know. The latter was much, much worse.

The Twins have unwittingly found themselves back in a pennant race, thanks to the rather unfortunate confluence of Cleveland's rise from the ashes and the Twins sinking into the sea. Cleveland has been waiting for us, they've been waiting like Penelope waited for Odysseus—and Batgirl thought that was pretty adorable actually. Sweet little Cleveland, who decided in 2002 to throw in the towel and start rebuilding. I guess it's safe to say that, much like the city of Athens, they've rebuilt.

We didn't see Cleveland coming—they were out of the division race in, like, the Bronze Age, and when they rolled in that nice wooden horsie with the big red bow on it we said, "Hey, thanks guys, that's really sweet! Thanks!" and opened up our gates for them then tucked ourselves snugly into our beds with dreams of postseason match-ups dancing in our heads.

Darkness fell. The Twins slept side-by-side in their bunks, chests rising and falling, teddy bears tucked in their arms, night caps firmly on their heads. A sound in the night. Is that coming from…the horse? Is it opening from the inside??? A door opens. Out pops Omar Vizquel. Out pops Victor Martinez. Out pops Travis Hafner and Ben Broussard! The Twins sleep on, the Cleveland players move like cats through the night toward their bunkhouse—until Carlos Silva, with his specially developed extrasensory hearing skills, wakes up from his bed, tosses his teddy bear to the floor, runs to the window, and sees these hooligans moving through city. "Never fear!" he shouts to the other players, "Carlos the Jackal is here!"

One by one, the Twins pop up in their beds. Matt LeCroy swears for the first time in his life, Lew Ford screeches, while Justin Morneau sets his jaw and picks up his bat. "No, no, guys, I got it!" Carlos says, reaching into his pajama pockets and picking out baseballs. Johan Santana and Brad Radke exchange glances—"Hey, Carlos, ¿Debemos hacer esto? You want us to get this?" Johan asks. "No, no," Carlos says. "Son los mios. They are mine!"

He inhales deeply, then hurls a ball out the window at Hafner. The ball flies four feet to Hafner's left. The players keep coming. Silva winds up again and throws the ball at Martinez—which sails a foot above his head. Rick Anderson hits his head against the wall and mutters, "First pitch balls," while Ford shrieks again. Silva bites his lip, takes in a deep breath, shouts, "I'll get it this time!" and hurls a ball at Broussard—who picks up some sort of stick, swings at the ball, and sends it sailing 500 feet back into the Twins bedroom, where it hits Lew Ford on the head.

So it went, this first August meeting between the Twins and their closest division rivals. This would have been a good game to win, since they were starting a pitcher with an ERA of googol, and we're just not so sure about Mulholland and Lohse. Poor BatLings made virtual screams of agony and despair in the comments section—one driven to drink, another to spontaneously combust, another to go to (gasp) Chipotle. As for Batgirl, she was thrown into the smooshy, gooshy embrace of Katie Couric, while the remnants of a wooden horse splintered at her feet. She's totally not going to fall for that one tomorrow.

Posted by Batgirl at August 13, 2004 10:01 PM