It wasn't even that good, but Fuckin' Deduno threw a gem, there were bats and gloves. Etc. Been awhile.

In any case, Mauer rejoins the squad today - which would make the people complaining about his absence TO TAKE CARE OF HIS WIFE AND MONTH-PREMATURE NEWBORNS happy if they were actually capable of joy.

In MiLB news, the Sano thing became sort of national, at least among people who talk about baseball prospects. But he returned to the lineup and went 1-3 and walked a couple times. Hopefully, whatever the hell happened is all in the past.

Eddie Rosario had recently missed some time with strep throat (he gets uncommon injuries, between this and the batting practice liner to the face last year) and has returned with a 1.004 OPS his last ten games. His bat is looking... ready.

And Byron Buxton seems to be in the process of figuring out high-A ball. The strikeouts are out of character for him, but he's like a year into his pro career and is now facing seasoned NCAA competition, so we'll trust the scouting reports on a very plus hit tool until he gives us reason to doubt that. He's at .244/.333/.578 the last ten. The power is surprising for a player with his profile, at his age, at this level. Hopefully it shows he's getting a handle on this pitching and he can start building that K:BB rate into the elite level we saw at Cedar Rapids.

In other news, my cat, Duane, died. He was somewhere between 16 and 20 years old, so we should have been readier for it. But he really went downhill fast. I don't think cats have baseball fan affiliations, but he's probably watched somewhere in the neighborhood of 1500 Twins games on TV in the time we've had him.