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THROWING YOU A CURVE
THE DIVISION-HEAVY SCHEDULES The Twins just won their 20th game of the season last night, 6-4 in 10 innings, against the Baltimore Orioles. Jacque Jones and Shannon Stewart hit back-to-back homeruns to lead off the top of the 10th and Joe Nathan pitched the bottom of the inning to save his 10th of the year. Good win for a team that is now 3.5 games behind the Central Division leading Chicago White Sox. The Sox have lost two straight to the Tampa Bay Devil Rays but are still playing very good baseball to start the season. It is too early to scoreboard watch, but the way the White Sox have started, the Twins don’t want them to get too big of a lead in the division. A team sometimes can start very strong and run away with their division early. Divisions can be won in the first two months of the season as well as in September. The Orioles still lead the Eastern Division by 1.5 games over the Boston Red Sox, but were hurt last night, not only losing to the Twins, but losing two outfielders in the process. Sammy Sosa was put on the 15-day disabled list because of an infected left foot and Luis Matos broke his right ring finger last night attempting to bunt during the game. They have a very good offensive ball club but you can’t lose players like Sosa and Matos and expect others to pick them up. It would be like the Twins losing Torii Hunter and Jacque Jones in the lineup. This will test the Orioles minor league system and the reserve players, but it will also give other players the opportunity to show the organization what they can do as an everyday major leaguer. Only time will tell. It is a shame that the Twins play the Orioles only six times throughout the season. The three games they are playing now and three more in July. The same can be said about the other teams in the Eastern Division. The Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays, and the Devil Rays only come to the Metrodome one time this season and that’s not right. I am in favor of interleague play, which the fans have embraced, but I do not like the 19 times the Twins play against each team in their division. Why not play each team in Central Division 15 times? That frees up 20 games throughout the season that the Twins can play against the other two divisions. The New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox have drawn very well at the Metrodome over the years but they only come into town once each season. That’s not fair to the Twins and other small market teams in their division! You would think that about an additional 100,000 or more fans would come into the dome to see the Yankees and Boston play instead of the Royals and the Indians. We’re talking some big crowds only coming once a year and it is costing a small market team some added revenue. Maybe enough revenue to keep a key player from leaving town and play somewhere else, like free agent Jacque Jones, at the end of the season. Baseball has to address this problem. What are your thoughts? You can e-mail me your thoughts or comments at bert@bertblyleven.com and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Be good to each other and thank you for reading my column. Positive thinking is the best way to handle difficult situations and I hope you stay positive.
Your baseball friend and you are hereby circled,
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