Marinerds, etc.

So, yeah. I'm back from Minneapolis, where I went to a wedding at the Metrodome. It was before an AMAZING Twins - White Sox game, where Johan Santana racked up 13 strikeouts, and when he loaded the bases in the 9th, Joe Nathan came in and racked up 3 more (consecutive) strikeouts for the shutout and save. The score was 5-0 Twins as unlikely (but adorable) heroes Morneau and Cuddyer came through with home runs. I'll post more of a report when I have pictures off my camera and whatnot; I got back to Seattle after midnight last night.

In the meantime, the Rainiers lost the PCL championships to Nashville, getting swept 3 games to none, their final game being a 5-2 loss in 13 innings on Friday night. I guess I don't have to feel bad about being away this weekend after all. The Timber Rattlers are done with their season as well, losing 4-0 against South Bend. They still fared fairly well, getting through three rounds of playoffs.

A guy on USSM posted a link to an article about Hunter Brown, which was pretty cool. I'd really like to see Brown up in Seattle as another utility guy next year, to see if he can do better than Bloomquist. As some of you know, I joked about changing my blog name to "Hunter Brown For Third", and I've been quietly cheering the guy since the time I went down to Tacoma to see Felix pitch back in May. I dunno, I thought he looked like a much better player than his rep at the time indicated (like when he was unceremoniously removed from the Future Forty for being "unable to hit AAA pitching"; obviously he got a lot better, as he finished the year at .291/.366/.448). So, yay.

The Phillies took the weekend's series against the Marlins, outscoring them 29-19. In Friday's game, it was 2-0 Florida when my plane took off, and when it landed I checked the score, saw the 13-3 Phillies win, and yelled "YES!" which got me a lot of funny looks on the plane. Saturday, I was at the Twins game and it was like 2-0 Florida again, 7th inning on the out-of-town scoreboard when we left. I checked the Phillies score a few hours later and saw the 10-2 with the 10 runs scored in the 9th inning and just said "WHAT?" Man, that is a crazy 9th inning. Lots of errors, lots of implosions. 10 runs. Holy crap, that's awesome. No 22nd win for you, D-train!