White Sox and Twins

And now another series is out of the way, with the Sox taking both games from the Twins. The Sox pitching wasn't that sharp, but the defense was. The maximum number of double plays a team can turn in two nine-inning games is 18. I think the Twins hit into about 14 of them. I can only imagine their frustration.
The Twins scored their first run Monday night on a balk. The Twins announcers didn't see a balk even after reviewing replays. I still haven't seen an explanation of what the ump saw. Didn't really matter as the White Sox were able to homer their way out of the problem.
Last nights game featured plenty of good defense by the Twins, but the key play was Torri Hunter's misplay of a fly ball into a double. That scored the first run for Chicago and opened the door for the second one. Later on Hunter made a good catch at the wall, but I'm not sure that that evens out.
There's also been some talk about this article from a Chicago paper, titled "Despising Minny to the Max". It's from a columnist from the powerful and influential paper, the Daily Southtown, and is written with almost as much venom as one of the Strib's sports columnists. In it he lists five reasons for hating the Twins. Go ahead and read it, because I'd like to respond.
The Twins play dirty. Outside of the well publicized Hunter collision with Jamie Burke last season, I haven't seen much dirty play from them. But that one play was dirty. If one of the White Sox players went out of their way to injure Joe Mauer, I'm sure most Twins fans would think that was dirty, too.
The Metrodome. Ladewski's right about this one. The dome is terrible for baseball. Can you imagine using one of the few nice weather days of the year cooped up in that plasitc bubble? Ugh. Spend even one game at an outside ballgame and you'll never want to go back. And don't get me started on the roof that's the same color as a baseball.
Zero name recognition. It's hard to hold this against a small market team. And it's not especially true. The Twins have the reigning Cy Young winner. Torii Hunter has gotten plenty of exposure on ESPN. And it's hard for me to judge otherwise, since I'm local.
The other point about their popularity in comparison to other local teams is spot on though. And I doubt the depth of the fandom that does exist. If this team slips to 10 games out, you can kiss any summer attendance goodbye.
Illegitamate in big games. I hate making judgements on teams on such small samples as this. Nope, they haven't done well in the playoffs in recent years. Neither did the Sox against Seattle in 2000. This doesn't mean much to me.
The child play of Hunter and Jacque Jones. There's a little something to this, but baseball as a whole is a target-rich field for this type of criticism, and Hunter and Jones aren't particularly egregious examples. Neither of them do the full Sosa, for example.

Now if you wanted reasons to 'hate' the Twins, here are some that strike me as more reasonable.
Playing the pity card as a small market. The AL Central is filled with small market teams. The Twins payroll has been in line with the other teams that the compete directly against. As recently as 2002, they had the largest payroll in the division. The White Sox payroll has blossomed this year, but it's not like the Twins are facing $100 million (or $200 million!) teams.
Continued whining about lack of respect. The Twins were easily the concensus pick to win the AL Central. I think they were last year, too. They're mentioned as a 'model franchise' by the national media. What more do they want?
Fair weather fans. This was a fan base that couldn't be bothered to show up for the last half of the 90's. They had a team that needed encouragment and they sat on their hands. Real fans support their teams even in down years. If this team goes south, the dome will empty out.
Of course, not all Twins fans are this way. Plenty of them will stick with their team through thick and thin. Every team has a core like that. The rest of them will drop them like a bad habit though.