Picking ourselves up (by putting others down)

Even though we won last night, some us are a little down on the Twins right now. What we need is a pick-me-up. The best way I know of to do that is to put others down.

Cleveland
Your best player, Grady Sizemore, is batting .238. Sabathia trade headliner, Matt LaPorta, has a .286 slugging percentage in the Majors. Put your night vision goggles on Cleveland because the future is dark.

And Cleveland doesn't rock. Here's a list of famous Northeast Ohio musicians. Yes, Frankie Yankovic made the list. A civil rights museum in Anchorage would be no more out of place than a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. Oh, and your economy sucks too.

Kansas City
Hey Royals, the Dead Ball Era called. They want their offense back! (insult comedy 101, people.) But in all seriousness, your team sucks. You have sucked for most of the last quarter century. The good news: at least you're used to your team being terrible.

After some careful analysis, I think I have figured out why you have been so atrocious. I'm calling it the Have Terrible Players Theory. This theory states that your team will be terrible if you always have terrible players. Right now you have two good players on your roster. One is a closer and pitches 65 innings a year. The other is sad often. The other 23 players on your roster are below average or some degree of terrible. It's entirely possible not one of your players will hit twenty home runs this year.

This 2009 Royals team fits nicely into the franchise's rich history of never having any good players on any of its teams ever. Here is a list of your All Stars from the last twenty years:

89: Mark Gubicza
90: Brett Saberhagen
91: Danny Tartabull
92: Jeff Montgomery
93: Jeff Montgomery
94: David Cone
95: Kevin Appier
96: Jeff Montgomery
97: Jose Rosado
98: Dean Palmer
99: Jose Rosado
00: Jermaine Dye
01: Mike Sweeney
02: Mike Sweeney
03: Mike Sweeney, Mike MacDougal
04: Ken Harvey
05: Mike Sweeney
06: Mark Redman
07: Gil Meche
08: Jokim Soria
09: Zach Greinke

Next year, and every year after that, you should line your players up and have George Brett slap each one in the face.

And you do NOT have "world famous barbecue." The only time I ever hear about Kansas City's world famous barbecue is when people from Kansas City tell me about their world famous barbecue. Similarly, roadside attractions are world famous because they have a billboard that says their attraction is world famous. (Note: all negative Wall Drug comments will be deleted.)

Washington
Yeah, Nationals, I know you're not in our division or even our league, but nothing makes one feel better about the state of his or her favorite franchise than the Washington Nationals. Why the hell would you sign Adam Dunn for two years $20 million? He makes you marginally less terrible and $20 million poorer. I'm sure you had nothing better to do with that money. Like, I don't know, sign Stephen Strasburg.

On the bright side you have a new stadium with a gorgeous view of the US Capital. Wait, parking ramp.

Well, I don't know about you guys, but I feel better.