#-1: Lynx (Last Week: -2). They won? They won! And it was an ass-kicking ... against a good team! The Jynx beat San Antonio by 23 points at Target Center last (Thursday) night. They were led by Rebekkah Brunson, who had 24 points and hauled in 10 rebounds.
Maybe this team shouldn't revolve around Seimone Augustus or Lindsay Whalen. Brunson, taken by the Jinks in the Sacramento Moncarchs Dispersal Draft, notched her eighth double-double of the season against San Antone, which is a new single-season record for the franchise. For her efforts, on Tuesday Brunson was named as a reserve member of the WNBA All-Star team that will face the national basketball team tomorrow (Saturday). She will be joined by Whalen, who scored 14 points and dished out five assists in the victory and was told today (Friday) that she will replace Silver Stars Guard Becky Hammon on the All-Star team. Hammon injured her quadriceps in ... the loss to the Lynx! Well played, Whalen!
It's stupid to be so giddy after just one game, but this may have been their best game of the year. They now in fourth place in the Western Conference, a half-game behind second place Phoenix. (Check out the standings at the break; Seattle has a nine-game lead in the West. Wow.) After the All-Star break, they begin the second half of the season Wednesday at home against Atlanta.
#-2: Twins (Last Week: -1). Ruh-roh. I partially take back what I said last week; the A.L. Central could remain a weak division, but that doesn't mean it isn't a competitive one. This might be a great race come September, but right now it's not looking good for the Twinks, who have scuffled to a 2-5 week, capped off by tonight's (Friday night's) 7-3 defeat to start a series at Detroit. I was at Target Field to witness the eighth-inning rimjob the Twinkies' bullpen offered for the Tampa Bay Rays, and it feels as if that collapse have pushed the team down another circle of Hell. They have lost three in a row now (the last two in the midweek series at Toronto) and haven't played well for about the last month or so. And it's everything -- lack of hittin with RISP, starting pitching, relief pitching, injuries, all of it. As a result, they have fallen from first to third in the division. And they are now three games behind the leading Tigers.
Worse yet, they're not going to get Cliff Lee to save them. Today (Friday) the Seattle Mariners inexplicably traded the left-handed friggin' pitcher godhead to their division rivals, the A.L. West-leading, and bankrupt, Texas Rangers. On paper, the Twins were supposed to have the inside track. But not only were they aced out by the Bastard Washington Senators 2.0, but they weren't even in the picture; this afternoon Lee was supposed to be sent to the New York Yankees (why help them, Seattle?). The Twins had a very good catching prospect, Wilson Ramos, who won't be on the club because of Joe Mauer, and they were willing to trade another good prospect, outfielder Aaron Hicks. Some people thought it was too much; I say that if you have a chance to increase your chances of making the postseason, you overpay for a surefire ace and use him to increase the your odds in the crapshoot that is the Major League Baseball playoffs. But it's all over now.
They finish the first half of the season with a pair at Detroit. There's the All-Star Game (congratulations to Mauer and Justin Morneau, even though Morneau probably won't play 'cause he's injured), and then the Twins start the second half of their season beginning Thursday at home against the hot (and second-place) Chicago White Sox.
#-3: Timberwolves (Last Week: -3). Is David Kahn just duplicating players in the same position just to fuck with us? The big news this week for the Woofie Dogs came just after LeBron James's decision to go to Miami, where the Heat traded Michael Beasley, the second player drafted in the 2008 NBA Draft and kind of a headcase, this way for a series of future draft picks. Have no idea if he'll have a superstar career a few people thought he'd have, but at least he's young. He's also a Small Forward tweener ... kind of like Wesley Johnson, the man Kahn drafted fourth overall in this year's NBA Draft ... and Martell Webster, whom they traded for on Draft Night. What the fuck, really?
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