Speak Of The Devil....

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9		R	H	E
LAA (14-11)	0	0	0	1	0	1	0	0	0		2	2	0		Final
MIN (15-9)	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1		1	4	1
W: B. Colon (4-2) L: J. Santana (4-1) S: F. Rodriguez (6)

I have been a bit, and will be a bit slow to post here since I have finals and whatnot, but I will try to post a few things.

Well, don't blame Lecroy and his bases loaded double play for this loss. Don't blame Gardy for keeping Joe Mauer on the bench most of the game. Don't blame Johan for giving up two solo shots. Don't blame Bartolo Colon and his great ground-ball-producing performance. Don't blame any of them.

Blame me.

When I start talking about Johan and his streak, what happens? He pitches a damn good game, but is outdueled 2-0 by the Angels. I totally jinxed him! Well maybe me and the metro area media. Oh, well it was fun while it lasted. I just wish he could have lost the record because he pitched poorly, not pitched well and received no run support.

That is just the way it goes in baseball though. Wins and losses can be quite flukey. Johan got a loss today while Corey Lidle got a win by giving up 5 runs in 5 1/3 innings. Now there is an overrated stat if there ever was one. Somehow people don't see that. It is the same people who picked Clemens over Johnson for the NL Cy Young last year.

Grant Balfour is out for the season. Now, this news is not getting the press it should be in my opinion. He is a very promising pitcher who would have served as a great right handed specialist out of our bullpen. The guy is just brutal against righties. We as Twins fans can count our blessings though since we still have Nathan, Rincon, Romero, and Crain to go to. The loss of Balfour will be much more noticeable if Rincon or Crain were to go down. Let's hope it doesn't.

Speaking of bullpen's, the Twins and Angels series showed off what is probably the two best bullpens in baseball. With Balfour we were no doubt better than theirs, but now the gap is a lot closer. I still think the Twins have the best bullpen in baseball overall, but the Angels have some great arms out there. In another year or two it will only get better considering all the young talent they have assembled. I fully expect both teams to win their divisions and maybe meet in the playoffs, thanks to their bullpens. Sorry Chicago fans, I just don't have faith in the Sux keeping up this great pitching. John Garland is bound to cool off sometime.