Having attended 1,000 or so baseball games, I can say without hesitation there’s little that I haven’t seen at one time or another: No-hitter (check). Game 7 of the World Series (check). Spring training (check). A 3,000th hit (check). A 3,000th strikeout and cycle in same game (check). Blowing 10-run lead (check). Ball stuck in Dome roof (check).  The list could go on with events both sacred and mundane.

But the thrills of recent days are an unprecedented combo platter of things that make baseball even better than a last-second touchdown pass or an off-balance three-pointer at the buzzer. From Wednesday night, when all seemed lost, through late Sunday afternoon, when the Dome again shook and then went all misty-eyed, there was hour-by-hour, inning-by-inning churn of drama that I don’t think you can find anyplace else.

Whether it was rubbing the thumb callous while the Twins were turning their 10-0 romp into a 10-7 semi-thriller… Cy Young Greinke v. M-V-P Mauer (and Kubel and Delmon) on Saturday… adopting the Mighty Whiteys in a Bloomington bar on Saturday night… watching Delmon create a new identity in these last few days… overlooking the flaws and relishing the over-achievements… and all of the events during and after Sunday’s game, baseball can do sustained drama like no other sport.

I may be biased about that, but you’ll just have to deal with it. And I understand that others — like the guy who had his purple van parked near the Metrodome at 6:30 this morning — likely have a different point of view.

Maybe it’s because there were so many valleys in this season that we feel like we’re standing on the highest peak right now — even if there’s no guarantee that there will be baseball for the Twins beyond Tuesday. The Twins are making this run with a Factory Outlet infield, their fourth-strongest defensive outfield, a patchwork starting rotation and a bullpen that’s been revised and re-revised in all spots except the very end.

This is better than 2006 because the stakes are higher. The final-weekend burst that season was only the difference between a division title and Wild Card berth. Tuesday, it’ll be like the title game for one of those college basketball conferences where only the winning team has a chance to go to the NCAA tournament. And the’re the added craziness of winning and then heading right to New York to open the playoffs, assuming the Yankees will want to get their postseason party started right away.

(Here’s the mlb.com explanation of the first-round playoff schedule: “In the Division Series, the New York Yankees will host the AL Central Champion (winner of the Tuesday, Oct. 6th DET @ MIN tie-breaker), while the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim will host the Boston Red Sox. The Yankees have clinched the best record in the American League and thus have the right to decide whether they will play in the seven-day or eight-day Division Series (i.e., whether it will start its Division Series on Wednesday, Oct. 7th or Thursday, Oct. 8th). The Yankees must make their selection no later than one hour following the completion of the DET @ MIN tie-breaker.”)

Whatever happens, this has been a season to remember — and to forgive and forget some of the things that some people were saying earlier, whether it those who misguidedly questioned Joe Mauer’s toughness or Jason Kubel being in the lineup every day, or whatever.

A 162-game season offers up plenty of chances for blockhead pronouncements. We all make them and we shouldn’t hold them against one another, especially we’re on the cusp of what would be a fantasy for so many suffering cities. I mean, have you ever talked to a Royals fan? Or a Pirates fan? Or … you get the idea.

Play on, guys.

I can’t tell you what was better — watching the Twins bounce back to beat the Royals in the afternoon or watching at Joe Senser’s in Bloomington as the Mighty Whiteys took care of Detroit and turned the AL Central into a tie. As the Detroit loss grew closer, more and more people turned their attention away from the other TV games and cheered on Chicago, a very strange feeling even when done for totally justifiable reasons. (Is it the best of both worlds when the White Sox win and AJ goes 0-for-5? That means he’s due for a big hit or two today, right?)

They were both better, and all the more because the Twins have total jurisdiction over their fate. If they win today and (if Detroit wins too) follow up by winning the one-game playoff on Tuesday, the Twins end this improbable stretch run with the division title and a postseason trip.

And they will end it largely owing to the unexpected heroics of Delmon Young and Michael Cuddyer. After going grand-slam deep against sad Lenny DiNardo on Friday night, Delmon opened the Twins lead from one run to four with a bases-loaded double off Zack Greinke, who should be as certain a choice for the Cy Young Award as Joe Mauer should be for M-V-P. At the time, it was a break-open-the-game hit. In time, it became incredibly needed because Jose Mijares again looked like a compilation of all the dreadful lefties who have pitched relief at the Dome over these 28 seasons.

And Cuddyer, reveling in the late-game decision to keep an overmatched left-handed September call-up on the mound in the eighth, got another of the clutch hits (his 31st home run) that run counter to the puke-spewing from some of those who pull apart statistics like string cheese.

Those people are not haters, they’re simply wrong — and somewhat stubborn.

For all of the grumpiness that has been a part of the season — including quite a bit that I have put forth — we are now in the final stages of a fantastic voyage. It’s like getting on the airplane thinking that you’re going to Cedar Rapids or Decatur and ending up in London or Paris. No matter the ultimate outcome, we will always have this ride to remember.

We watched Nick Blackburn pitch like a stud for the fourth straight outing, when excellence was needed, and we should be able to forgive his midseason horrors — all the while challenging him to pitch like this for enough of future seasons that he becomes the well-above-.500 pitcher that many of us think he can become. We are watching Delmon make a pitch for becoming a no-brainer choice in the outfield after this season, even when Justin Morneau returns to health. That would turn Carlos Gomez into a fourth outfielder and supreme high defensive replacement. We are seeing Denard Span gun himself into being one of the elite young outfielders in the majors, a .300+ hitter who plays well in center and dazzles in the corner outfield spots

We are seeing a team that still needs enhancements and improvements for 2010 and beyond. But it is a team that may find those moves easier to make, especially when it comes to free agents, because of the pluck that is being shown by the current roster. If you’re Chone Figgins and want out of L.A. … (Wait, that’s getting ahead of ourselves. Way ahead.)

By sundown, one of three things will happen — a division title, a one-game playoff or a mad rush that ends in disappointment. This from a team that was seven games behind the Tigers a month ago and 5 1/2 games back three Sundays ago. In two of those three outcomes, the Dome gets an extended farewell beyond the formalities of the regular-season finale.

I suspect that some of the members of the ‘87 Twins who are part of this weekend’s festivities see a little bit of themselves in what’s happening right now. And we all know how their season turned out.

When Delmon Young swung in the first inning last night, it made the kind of sound Twins fans have been waiting for since the beginning of last season — that sweet-sounding thwack that carries back to the seats behind home plate while the baseball carries long and without question over the wall in left-center. The standing ovation Delmon received after giving the Twins that 5-0 lead was the sort of noise that filled the Metrodome in 1987 and ‘91, the kind of pounding that the heart loves and the ear (after a while) needs relief from.

Nothing reached that level again, although the Dome was a merry place as the Twins took their 10-0 lead in the fourth inning and an increasingly nervous one as the bullpen set out to remind us of Luis Ayala, Sean Henn, Philip Humber and the others who came and went during the more troubling days of 2009. The crowd was divided between those who were there for the baseball and those who came to say there were there for the final weekend of baseball at the Dome. The latter group were the ones who were filing out of the Metrodome while the Royals pulled uncomfortably closer.

And the scoreboard watching was a game of who-could-see-it-change first. Ms. Baseball and I listened in the car to Scott Podsednik go deep to lead off the White Sox-Detroit game and, in our section, it was a race to overhear who would be the first to call out as the Mighty Whiteys (our term-of-affection for the weekend) added to their lead.

Will the Twins’ best personnel move of this season be that the White Sox made that trade for Jake Peavy?

The task gets tougher today. Nick Blackburn of three days of rest vs. Zack Greinke, who will be trying to nail down the Cy Young Award. You can work hard to pull out numbers that can give you hope — Greinke is 2-9 pitching on artificial turf and 5-7 pitching in Domes, with similarly medicore statistics across the board in those environments. Blackburn has been at his best (a 3.18 ERA) pitching in day games.

But finding those numbers is pretty much like fishing for carp from the dock, hardly an exercise worth pursuing. Greinke has been masterful on a consistent basis and Blackburn has been maddening in his inconsistency, although the 3 earned runs given up in his last 3 starts gives good reason for hope. Best practice today isto throw out the past and let the weekend do its magic.

This is also a day to put aside what happens if the Twins manage to pull off this thing and become the first team since divisional play started 40 years ago to win a division title after trailing by 3 games with only 4 left to play. Let’s bag the “all-this-to-play-the-Yankees” sentiment.

The Twins just need to take it one mountain at a time.

As much as many of us have declared the season all but over, I’m perfectly willing and ready to be wrong.

I am ready to be the best White Sox fan you can imagine for a weekend.

I will never boo A.J. Pierzynski again if the White Sox sweep the Tigers.

I am prepared to believe in Jeff Manship tonight.

I will not cringe at Tolbert and Punto being in the lineup.

I want to donate nine more items to the k-bro foodshelf challenge. (The total is 47, as of today.)

I will double that number to 18 if the Twins sweep and the Tigers get swept.

I will expect Delmon Young and Jose Mijares to hug it out.

I believe Zack Greinke will get smacked around on Saturday.

I know Gardy will use his bullpen well.

I expect Jason Kubel will end the season with 100 RBIs.

What are you doing?

The flight attendant didn’t grab my Crackberry last night even though I ignored the first couple of warnings to turn off all electrical devices because the plane was going to take off soon. I was getting the 15-second refresh on mlb.com and the Twins had the bases loaded … and I figured that a 2-0 start was a good thing even though Jose Morales grounded into that double play. Unfortunately, the Gamecast gave no sense that Delmon Young’s bases-loaded single was anything other than a routine hit, so I didn’t know that the Twins would have led 5-0 in a ballpark if they hadn’t been playing in Comerica’s  jumbo-sized center field.

Then, as soon as the wheels hit the ground in the Twin Cities, I fired up the C’berry and …

DET 7 , MIN 2 (seventh inning)

$#!+The bad news was what happened, the good news was that I didn’t have to watch Carl Pavano serve those meatballs to Inge and Ordonez and the others.

Because  it’s pretty unfair to comment of what I didn’t see go down, I will let Joe’s game story and Jim’s column stand in for me.

For now, I’ll say out loud what I suspect most of us understand: Missing their first baseman, third baseman and 60 percent of their anticipated rotation and having underperformers playing daily in left field and at second and third bases, the Twins dragged out this thing for a long, long time in September. You can win with a cobbled together and mirror-filled lineup for a period of time. But not indefinitely.

And that definitely has caught up with the Twins this week.

Now, there’s nothing but hope.