We hope to get comment threads embedded in our stories sometime soon, but for the time being, here's the spot to offer your reactions to Britt Robson's interview with Wolves owner Glen Taylor (short version; long version).

Okay, Hunter I understand. But Silva? I don't care how thin the free agent market is, or how young the other Twins starters are; paying the dude $4.3 million to serve up batting practice just doesn't seem like sound payroll management. Hey, I like the guy as much as anyone else. But he's a sinkerball pitcher who lost his sinker. He had all season to find it, and in the end he put up, what, two decent games?More >>

On Wednesday--that's tomorrow night for online readers--the CP cover story will be Britt Robson's pre-season interview with the remarkably candid Glen Taylor. Here's a short excerpt, on the subject of last year's trade of Wally Szczerbiak to Boston.

City Pages: What about the deal with Boston? Because I heard different things. I heard Banks was the key to it. Some people were saying the key was Ricky Davis because of his quickness and his ability to play defense and get up and down the floor on offense. But the one that really got to me is that you were trading a center who had an expiring contract, Michael Olowakandi, for a center who has a lot of money owed him for a lot of years down the road, Mark Blount. And Blount's skill set is such that it seems you are going to be asking Kevin Garnett to do a lot of the dirty work of rebounding and interior defense.

Glen Taylor: Yeah, I would say that the trade with Boston was pretty complicated. Even the reasons for doing it.

CP: You mean the friction between Garnett and Szczerbiak?

Taylor: I'm just saying there was probably more to it that had to do with Wally that we have chosen not to talk about--that Kevin has never said and we have never said. I am just going to say that no matter what I say, people are going to deny it. But I would say some things came to a head that forced us to get into something we didn't necessarily want to do. I think it would have been pretty dangerous for Kevin McHale not to do the trade. That kind of thing. And that's all I'll say about that.

You also had Michael [Olowakandi], and the Michael thing was festering on the team. It wasn't that Michael went up and down [in his on-court performance]. It was that Michael... Very seldom do you see someone with such poor relationships with the other players, and I am saying all of them. It was just that they could not feel he was a team player.

What we were dealing with, with a new coach, was probably some potential problems in the locker room. And I think we were forced to go out and get the deal we got. It is a little bit like, after you got that deal, you have to go out and manufacture the positives of the deal. So that's why you heard a number of things.

CP: So the deal was more about erasing negatives that creating positives?

Taylor: When we started out. Okay. Ricky [Davis] is a person McHale has always liked. This is not the first time he has tried to get Ricky. He's different from Wally, but I don't know that we dropped down there. We got a lower contract and Wally's contract was going to create a big problem for us later on. And the relationship in the locker room was way better. So we had the [approval] of our players and all that. If we could have done [Szczerbiak-for-Davis] straight up, that would have been a deal. But to get rid of Michael, we had to take Mark. It isn't that we didn't like Mark and didn't want Mark. He's a good player and not a bad guy. But the pay isn't right.

The season starts in less than a week. The general consensus is that if things don't click this season, the team's in for a major overhaul. Meanwhile, Britt's still rousing from his off-season slumber. So what do you think? Is there room for optimism? Does Garnett have a strong enough supporting cast to get his team to the post-season? Will KG ever see the post-season as a Timberwolf again? Let the predictions fly.

Twins General Manager Terry Ryan announced today that the team has picked up the $12 million option on Torii Hunter's contract. That means the would-be free-agent center fielder, whose name has been thrown around in trade rumors all year long, will remain a Twin for at least one more season. Negotiations to continue into the off-season re: a long-term contract.More >>

Star first baseman and manager in the Negro leagues, Buck O'Neil, died last Friday of congestive heart failure in Kansas City, Missouri. John Jordan O'Neil Jr., the grandson of a slave, was born in 1911 in Carrabelle, Florida, and was playing semipro baseball by age 12. In 1938, following semi-professional "barnstorming" experiences with the Miami Giants, New York Tigers, Shreveport Acme Giants, and Zulu Cannibal Giants, O'Neil joined the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro American League. Read the rest of the story at Corpus Obscura.

Subject: Are they saying "Boo" or "Boof"?

From: G.R. Anderson Jr.
To: Britt Robson; Chuck Terhark

I honestly have never seen a team come out in a playoff series flatter at the plate than this one. It's reminiscent of the final 2004 game against the Yankees, except this has gone on for two games. The number of first pitches taken has to be obscene; conversely nearly every Twins hitter looks impatient swinging at bad pitches because he is constantly behind in the counts. How many hits combined for Mauer, Cuddyer, Morneau, Hunter thus far?

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Subject: Ouch. Actually, double ouch.

From: Chuck Terhark
To: Britt Robson

Wow, two homers by Frank Thomas and suddenly the Twins are underdogs.

The knee-jerk reaction here--and believe me, I heard plenty of it out in the right-field stands this afternoon--goes something like, "Nice time to lose your first home game in over a year, Johan," or "Why the hell did Gardy put Crain in there?" or, immediately afterward, "Why the hell didn't Crain pitch around Thomas?" Those are all understandable points, especially that last one (the Big Hurt was so keyed up, his only strikes were 400-foot foul balls), but the bottom line is you just can't blame the pitching for this one.

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Subject: If you're only going to spend one day in first place, always pick the last day of the season

From: Steve Perry
To: Britt Robson

I can't imagine we'll ever see another finish like that one. On top of the Twins' miracle second half, we got to see an almost-as-historic collapse by Detroit in the last week. I tuned in the Twins game around 1:30 today, but I actually spent most of the afternoon watching the Tigers and Royals on Extra Innings--a much more remarkable game, as it turned out. The Tigers scored five in the third to take a 6-0 lead into the fourth inning, but the Royals came right back in the top of the fourth to score three, and from that moment on, you could feel the doom wafting off the field and through the television. And sure enough, the Tigers found a way to lose: After they loaded the bases with 1 out in the bottom of the 11th, Brandon Inge and Curtis Granderson struck out, and the Royals scored twice in the 12th to finish a three-game sweep.

Now this is a Kansas City team that came to town already having lost 100 games, with a team ERA over 6.00 and exactly one legitimate major league hitter--David DeJesus--in a lineup larded with September callups. And the Tigers, needing to win only one game against this blighted crew, couldn't pull it off. I've never particularly believed in "clutch performers," but I certainly believe in chokers, and the Tigers are turning blue at this point. I can't remember ever seeing any team limp into the playoffs as snake-bitten as Detroit is now. (St. Louis stumbled badly down the stretch as well, but it's harder to call that a choke--the Cardinals pretty much suck this year, and they'd be nowhere near the playoffs if they weren't in the weakest division in baseball.) I'll be surprised if the Tigers win more than one game against the Yankees.

And though it's a moot point now, I'm one of those people who thought the Twins would have been better off facing the Yankees in the best-of-five Wild Card round. Simple reason: The Yankees are the only team in either league that's better than the Twins. If you put the two head-to-head for 162 games, there isn't much doubt who'd come out on top. The shorter the series, the better, because it improves the chances that a few lucky bounces and one or two dominant performances could skew results the Twins' way.

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