ST. PETERSBURG, FLA. — OK, I’m trying to grasp what I’m about to experience here at Tropicana Field tonight.

I came here many times covering the Orioles and have made a couple trips here covering the Twins. But never before this year.

I have been, ahem, fairly critical of this place, but I can’t remember being here when there were more than 17,000 people in the seats. Tonight, I think they’re expecting a crowd of about 21,000 with about 30,000 expected the next two days.

If the Rays win two games in this series, the Twins will watch them celebrate a playoff berth.

Update (4:05 p.m.): Brian Buscher is day-to-day after jamming his left thumb on a play at first base Thursday. The thumb is still sore today, so Matt Tolbert is at third base.

(*) The Twins have allowed 13 home runs in their past four games. That needs to change, especially in these next two starts by Glen Perkins and Nick Blackburn, for things to begin turning around.

Four times in the past five games, the Twins’ starter has not made it through the fifth inning. That also needs to change.

Twins (82-70)

1. Denard Span, RF
2. Alexi Casilla, 2B
3. Joe Mauer, C
4. Justin Morneau, 1B
5. Jason Kubel, DH
6. Delmon Young, LF
7. Matt Tolbert, 3B
8. Nick Punto, SS
9. Carlos Gomez, CF

Starting pitcher: LH Glen Perkins (12-4, 4.40 ERA)

Rays (90-60)

1. Akinori Iwamura, 2B
2. Jason Bartlett, SS
3. Carlos Pena, 1B
4. Evan Longoria, 3B
5. Rocco Baldelli, DH
6. Dioner Navarro, C
7. Ben Zobrist, LF
8. Gabe Gross, RF
9. Fernando Perez, CF

Starting pitcher: RH James Shields (13-8, 3.50)

Tropicana Field. First pitch: 6:10 p.m.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 18th, 2008 at 2:57 pm and is filed under Twins thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.