We learned yesterday that Twins bullpen phenom Pat Neshek is indeed human as he allowed his first run in the big leagues, ballooning his era to 1.08. And I fear he may become a lot more human in the coming weeks as hitters adjust to his funky sidearm delivery.

But now we discover that Neshek, like an alarming 12-million Americans, has a blog. It's regularly updated, if somewhat haphazardly written. The main purpose of it seems to be chronicling his experiences with autograph seekers. Which seems kind of odd but he does deliver this genius nugget.

One grapher was awesome and hooked me up with a signed Rob Zombie album cover, I was pumped to get a metal autograph so I hooked him up with a couple MLB balls during BP.

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It was clear to everyone paying attention that the Twins would need to play well on their most recent road trip to contend for a spot in the playoffs. As it turns out, "play well" doesn't begin to describe the last six games, five of which the Twinks won. Their sweep (yes!) of the White Sox pulls them into a three-way tie for the Wild Card.

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The Twins hunt for October, while rumors trade fly about Alfonso Soriano heading to the White Sox. The rest of the season starts now.

The Twins enter this week's road series a paltry three games back in the American League Wild Card race, a fact that is nothing short of miraculous considering they were nine games back at the All-Star break earlier this month. At that point, they needed to overcome three other teams to even consider a shot at the post-season. Eleven games (and nine wins) later, they arrive in Chicago with a shot at pulling into a tie for first with the slumping White Sox.

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Is the starting rotation solid enough for a legitmate run?

On May 15, the stat-heads at Baseball Prospectus offered a pretty bleak view of the Twins '06 chances after stumbling out of the gate. "Is the Twins' season over?" the headline in Sport Illustrated asked, and the answer for any Twins fan, deep down, was a barely muttered, "Yeah, probably."

The folks at BP figured the AL was so stacked that 97 wins would be needed to make the Wild Card spot, a ridiculously high number that may, after all, turn out to be about right--just a few too high. With that, the item concluded, "Minnesota would have to play at a .641 pace to have a better than even-money chance at the playoffs."

Since then, amazingly, the Twins have been better than that, going 39-21 for a .650 clip.

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The first half of the 2006 baseball season is behind us, and while it hasn't exactly been a winning season per se for our dear Twinks (in any other division it might have been), it certainly has been one hell of an interesting ride. If you ask me, the Twins' troublesome year boils down to this: They are in the last year of a budgetary cycle that has allowed them to keep stars like Torii Hunter and Johan Santana on the same team. Most front offices would look at that as a good time to make a run at the playoffs while breaking in the stars of the near future, namely the M&M boys, "Franchise," Kubel and Bartlett. Instead, Terry Ryan opened the season with a 50-game experiment in the usefulness of washed up veterans, fielding the likes of Batista, Castro, White and Sierra. The experiment failed, of course, so horrifically in fact that it looks like most of my preseason predictions were made through Justin Morneau's rose-colored contact lenses.More >>

Last weekend, St. Paul boxer Will Grigsby travelled to St. Louis to take in the Cory Spinks-Roman Karmazin light middleweight title fight. But it wasn't just a pleasure trip for the former four-time junior flyweight belt holder. While in the Gateway City, Grigsby--who holds the distinction of being Minnesota's first boxing champ since World War I--also inked a deal to fight current IBF titlist Ulises Solis. Grigsby has been itching for the bout since January 7, when Solis got the best of him in a 12-round decision at Madison Square Garden.

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ESPN.com is reporting that the Timberwolves have signed free agent point guard Mike James to a 4-year, $25-million contract. While teams cannot officially confirm signings until tomorrow, Minnesota has been pursuing James assiduously, and, according to ESPN.com, beat out rival suitors by extending James out to four years rather than the three Dallas and Houston were apparently offering.

What does this mean?

1) The huge Boston trade can now officially be labeled a colossal mistake.
This signing, on top of drafting combo guard Randy Foye in the first round, means the Wolves have made Marcus Banks half-past redundant.

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In the end, Francisco Liriano did not win the fan balloting for the last roster spot on the AL All-Star Team--the White Sox cinched it with a can't-miss "Punch AJ" promotion on behalf of their widely loathed catcher--but at least baseball pundits near and far bitched about Liriano's exclusion. They pretty much ignored Justin Morneau's case for making the squad.

Morneau pulls into the All-Star break with 23 HR and 73 RBI--slightly more than the man players elected as a sub in front of him, the White Sox's Paul Konerko (21 HR, 67 RBI), who has had a season nearly identical to Morneau's in most respects. Though Morneau is playing a distant second fiddle to hometown hero Joe Mauer in the press, his breakout is nearly as stunning. Here's where Morneau ranks among his 1B peers and Major League hitters at large at the break:

HR: 7th in the AL; 14th (tied) in the majors; 5th among ML 1B

RBI: 4th in the AL; 8th in the majors; 3rd among ML 1B

SLG PCT (.587): 11th among all ML hitters; 4th among ML 1B

ON-BASE PLUS SLG PCT (.939): 21st among all ML hitters; 3rd among AL 1B; 7th among ML 1B

How's he made such a dramatic difference from 2005, when he hit 22 HR in 490 at-bats and posted a .742 OPS? The answer looks to be timing and confidence. Morneau hasn't really adjusted his approach at the plate--comparing this year to last, he still sports that upper-cut swing, still looks at about 3.5 pitches per at-bat, still strikes out once every 5-6 plate appearances and walks once in every 13. But those upper-cuts are connecting a lot more often: His groundball ratio has gone down dramatically, which is always good news for a power hitter, and his HR rate has nearly doubled (one longball every 22 AB in 2005, one every 12 AB this year).

Which is a long way of saying Morneau will play in a few All-Star games before he's through.