Joe Nathan makes Armando Benitez look clutch!

Ok, the better team won. No one will dispute that. How can you not call a team that has 4X the payroll of the team it’s playing not the better team. But that’s not the point.

Yes, you can say that the Carlos Gomez base running mistake cost the Twins the game. Yes, you can say that the Joe Mauer fair ball that was called foul cost the Twins the game (How does that happen? It wasn’t even close and the umpire was 6 feet away slooking right at it!  Seriously, look at the picture below and see for yourself!)

You can come up with any number of reasons that the Twins lost the game but it all comes down to one thing. Joe Nathan. Joe Nathan costs the Twins the game. And the shame of it all is that Joe Nathan is a huge MLB star making lots of money (the kind that play for the Yankees).

It’s not like the Yankees beat up on a low payroll guy. The guy made $11,250,000.00 this year (yes you have the number of digits to the left of the decimal point correct), and that doesn’t count whatever he received for making the All-Star team or any other performance bonuses he may have.

Joe Nathan is the 2nd highest paid player on the Minnesota Twins and was the higest paid player in uniform last night! His salary is just about 20% of the entire teams payroll! The Twins have a payroll of 60 million. Michael Cuddyer makes 7.66 million, Joe Mauer makes 10.5 million, Justin Morneau makes 11.6 million, Joe Nathan makes 11.25 million and the rest of the team makes a combined approx. 20 million!

Let’s call it as it is, Joe Nathan makes Armando Benitez look clutch. SERIOUSLY! He puts up huge stats in the regular season. The guy is unhittable! Look at the stats, the guy matches or surpasses Mariano Rivera across the board!

Consider this, in the past 5 years Joe Nathan has an ERA well under 2.00 and a WHIP well less than 1.00!

But then there’s the post season. Did you see him hyperventilating out there on the mound? And he was eating his shirt! Don't believe me? Look at the picture! And that was before the HR to A-Rod!

Nathan has now pitched in 7 post season games. In these 7 post season games he’s pitched 7.1 innings, given up 10 Hits, 7 walks and 7 runs. He only gave up 16 runs this entire year! And that was over 70 games! And last year he only gave up 10 runs the entire year! He’s given up 7 runs in 7 games!

I know the best team won and I know it’s inevitable that they will win the series. But Nathan gets paid what he does on the Twins for one reason and one reason only; for games like that one.

What a shame for the other guys on the team playing their hearts out. He’s should give them all a portion of his salary. - Peter Costa

Pete is a serious Rotisserie participant playing the same league with the same guys for 18 years. Not only has Peter never finished in the money; he’s now finished last 14 times and no higher than 10th (in a league with 14 guys). Join us in following Peter’s trials, tribulations and frustrations, as he attempts to navigate his way out of the basement again in 2010.

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Have a Fantasy Football or Rotisserie baseball question? Want to know who to pick up, who to activate and who the hot prospects are? Ask Dr. Roto. Let Dr. Roto guide your team to a league championship.

These are the memories that grandparents pass on to their grand children

If you love sports and drama, you had to love last night’s Detroit Tigers vs. Minnesota Twins "Play-In game." We see and hear every day what is wrong with sports today, but that that game shows what is good about sports. 

And how can you not root for the Twins (unless you are from Detroit). The Twins came from 7 games back in the final month winning 17 of their last 21 games, extending the game to a 163rd game to win the division.

It took 12 innings to crown a champion. Game 163, the "play-in game,” was filled with back-and-forth scoring, pitching showdowns and critical at-bats. The dramatic 4 1/2-hour affair came to an end when Alexi Casilla singled to right field, allowing Carlos Gomez to score from second base and capping off a 6-5 victory for the Twins over the Tigers, giving Minnesota its fifth division title in the past eight seasons.

"That is as good a baseball game as I've ever been involved as far as courage from both teams. We came through at the end. But after 10 innings I was like, 'Oh my gosh, I've never seen anything like this.' It was just back and forth, neither team giving up."  - Manager Ron Gardenhire

If you were one of the 54,088 fans (the largest regular-season crowd in Metrodome history) you have a memory that will last you a life time. These are the memories that grandparents pass on to their grand children.

Listening to the Tigers comments reminded me of listening to Peter Rose after the Carlton Fisk HR game in game 6 of the 1975 World Series. He was on the losing end of the game, but he said that it was the greatest game he had ever played in and was privileged to be a part of it.

The game had everything, clutch pitching, clutch hitting, defensive blunders, defensive stellar plays, blown calls by the umpire with the game on the line (the ball did in fact hit the shirt of Brandon Inge) and all with the season on the line. I didn’t have a dog in the fight, but that was definitely the most interest I had watching a game this year, including ones that involved the team I root for.

The Twins now move on to play the Yankees in the 1st round Division Series AL playoffs. To say that they are an underdog is an understatement. After playing a 163rd game yesterday (moved back 1 day because the “Brett Favre” Monday night football game was in the Metrodome) they now have to play a 6:07 pm game at Yankee Stadium in NY. After going 12 innings in a tension filled extravaganza their bull pen is now depleted and they are mmentally and physically exhausted. Oh, and they are without their All-Star 1st basemen Justin Morneau .

Under manager Ron Gardenhire’s tenure they are 3-21 against the Yankees. But there is hope. In the playoffs they are 2-2 against them. And they now have karma on their side.

You would have to be a fool to predict that the Twins will win the series, but unless you are a devout Yankee fan, it’s going to be hard not to root for the Cinderella team of 2009. - Josh Bolan

Josh Bolan is a retired AP baseball reporter and now works as a freelance writer in Fresno California. Josh has been contributing to baseball publications as a writer since 1996.

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Have a Fantasy Football or Baseball question? Want to know who to pick up, who to activate and who the hot prospects are? Ask Dr. Roto. Let Dr. Roto guide your team to a league championship.

For the Twinkies the 2009 MLB season starts tonight

Alright, this is it. For the Twinkies the 2009 MLB starts tonight. They have 16 games remaining left on their regular season schedule and 7 of them are against the division leading Detroit Tigers. The Twins are 4 games back so at a minimum, if they are going to catch the Tigers you have to figure that they have to go 5-2 against them putting them only one game behind.

The Tigers have led start to finish and if they do not win at this point, would be considered the "New York Mets of the American League."

Minnesota does have their destiny in their own hands because if they win at least 6 of the remaining 7 games against Detroit, they just have to have a better record than Detroit in the 9 remaining games each team has.

The Twins do have 9 other games to play on their schedule and have to play 6 games against Zack Greinke, Billy Butler and the Kansas City Royals.

You might think that getting to play the Royals is a good thing but the Royals are streaking to the finish going 8-2 in their last 10 games and the Twins are scheduled to face Greinke 2 out of those 6 games.

Trying to score against Greinke has become somewhat of a comedy as teams are trying just about anything to get a run against him attempting to sacrifice runners, bunt for hits, take pitches, even trying to intentionally get hit by pitches as the guy has pitched to a miniscule 2.14 ERA striking out 244 batters, more than a batter per inning (210 innings) and giving up only 44 walks and 180 hits all season pleasing fantasy owners with 1.06 WHIP.

The Twins remaining 3 games are against the White Sox who while not mathematically eliminated at 6 ½ back and having 6 games remaining against the Tigers themselves, would probably have to have to sweep the Tigers all 6 games and also jump over the Twins which would mean that the Tigers would have to lose practically all 12 of their 16 remaining games against the Twins and White Sox for the White Sox to have a shot.

The Twins will be without one of their studs in All-Star Justin Morneau the rest of the way as he is shut down for the season with a stress fracture in his lower back. Morneau was having another stellar season with 30 HR’s and 100 RBI and three weeks left to go in the season. Michael Cuddyer having a decent year himself with 26 HR’s and 78 RBI has moved in from the outfield will get the starts at 1st base the rest of the way.

The way I see it is that since Cuddyer has moved to 1st base, Delmon Young and Carlos Gomez are both going to be getting regular at bats down the stretch in the outfield along with Denard Span. Neither one has done bupkus all year, but they were both top prospects and have both the ability and chance to redeem themselves by getting hot and carrying this team to the playoffs. - Paul Leume

Paul Leume is a MLB columnist from Montreal, Canada. Paul, a one-time beat writer covering the Montreal Expos for the Montreal Gazette is a proud grandfather of 3 girls and now spends his time offering his thoughts and prospective on Major League Baseball on a variety of blogs and websites throughout Al Gore’s internet.

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Have a Fantasy Football or Rotisserie Baseball question? Want to know who to pick up, who to activate and who the hot prospects are? Ask Dr. Roto. Let Dr. Roto guide your team to a league championship!