The All-Star break makes a timely split for Major League Baseball, which has already played through a brisk first half, filled with surprises, great plays, dramatic outcomes, and indelible memories.

The Minnesota Twins, in fact, finished the first half with a perfect flourish, responding to getting blown out by Detroit with three straight victories over the Tigers. That made it almost a dream homestand for the Twins for several reasons.

First, when the Tigers crushed the Twins in two early-season series, it appeared there would be no way this year’s Twins team could ever get near the competitive level of the Tigers. But in the final game before All-Star break, the Twins beat the Tigers 7-1, completing a series that was an astonishing mirror-image reversal of Detroit’s early-season domination of the Twins.

Not only did their strong finish include two walk-off home runs for Brian Dozier – including the one that capped a seven-run ninth-inning rally for a 9-7 victory – but all the whining and protests of provincial Twins fans that Dozier deserved to be on the American League All-Star game were answered. Kansas City manager Ned Yost had to make a late addition because of an injury, and he picked Dozier.

As fans, we’re all provincial when it comes to All-Star games. The new young studs who fill up both rosters are pretty generally unknown to fans of the other league, and even within the league, it takes time to get acquainted with the 22 and 23-year-old generation moving into dominance.

Of course, we were pulling for Glen Perkins, our Minnesota native who is 28-for-28 in save opportunities to lead the Major Leagues. He got voted to the team as Minnesota’s lone representative, after getting a colorful save in last year’s All-Star game in Minneapolis.


And we were excited when Dozier got added, even though, as the No. 3 second baseman, we didn’t expect him to get more than a token appearance.

He did get in, to hit one time in the eighth inning. Mark Melancon, Pittsburgh’s bullpen ace and the only pitcher in the Majors with more saves than Perkins, 29, had just struck out two AL hitters. And he got two strikes on Dozier, who then smacked a drive to center field. It carried, and carried, and landed on top of the fence, and stayed there. In his first All-Star game, his only at-bat, Dozier homered.

That made it 6-2 for the American League, and, as if to show that teamwork prevails, that extra run gave Perkins just the right cushion so he could pitch the ninth inning. He gave up a run, and it didn’t even hurt as the AL won 6-3.
   
One of the other highlights, for fans of either league, and the players on both teams, came when Cincinnati’s own Aroldis Chapman came in to pitch the ninth inning. The lanky left-hander has thrown more pitches over 100 mph than all the rest of the Major League pitchers combined. Chapman struck out the side, and all nine of those strikes were from 100 to 104 mph.  

The game itself, played this year in Cincinnati on Tuesday, is rescued from being completely meaningless by providing the winning side from having home-field advantage for the World Series. That is no small benefit, since the American League uses the designated hitter while the National League makes the pitchers hit for themselves. That makes a significant difference in strategy, for using pinch-hitters, bunting, and other strategy bits.

Preceding the game is the annual home-run contest, and this year that became more fun by altering the rules and pairing up hitters in eliminations, down to the final, where Cincinnati third baseman Todd Frazier came from behind in his allotted 4-minutes-plus to beat Los Angeles Dodgers rookie Joc Pederson 15-14.

Earlier, Frazier had thrilled the hometown fans by also rallying in the closing seconds to beat Prince Fielder and Josh Donaldson on his final swing.

The change to give hitters a time limit made a huge difference, because the contest had devolved into a too-patient study in boredom. Batters would take almost-perfect pitches in hopes of getting an even better pitch from a self-picked pitcher tossing up softies. With a time limit, it made sense to swing at every pitch, a far better strategy for the fans to enjoy.

The players? They all seemed to enjoy themselves. The game is a celebration of perceived excellence. And once you’ve been selected to be on the team, it’s got to be a big a thrill to be the top vote-getter – but almost as big a thrill to get named as a late addition.

Just ask Brian Dozier.

Now the Twins return to American League play at 49-4. The Twins still are second to Kansas City, by 4.5 games, but they also lead the third-place Tigers by 4.5 games.

Trampled By Turtles, Greyhounds, and Hunters

It’s no secret that there simply isn’t the same quantity of sports events in the Duluth area in the summertime as there is in the winter – particularly in hockey season.
 In the summertime, we have to do the recreational sports thing, although we can go to area stock car dirt races, or to Huskies games at Wade Stadium. Mainly, we can go hiking, or biking, or traveling...And I have one other major summer sports suggestion: Do your hiking down to Bayfront Festival Park to witness something like last Saturday night’s Trampled By Turtles concert.

Now, Bayfront is well-known as a music venue, a reputation which could only have been enhanced by the near-flawless music festival that played there last weekend.

But that Bayfront area, which is right next to AMSOIL Arena and all its hockey, is going to take on a new hockey highlight. Word has it that next February 6, at Bayfront, there will be a Duluth addition to the current trend of outdoor hockey extravaganzas. Duluth East will play Lakeville North, and Denfeld will face Thief River Falls at Bayfront.

Duluth is the perfect setting for an outdoor hockey scene. After all, so many areas around the country, and the Twin Cities, have put on outdoor games without any historical significance. In Duluth, rink rats are a breed unto themselves. Things may be dying out in that regard in this video game generation, but a lot of current high school and college players got their start in the game by playing Mites, Squirts, Peewees and even Bantams on our traditional outdoor rinks all across Duluth.

That makes it most fitting to have outdoor wintertime hockey, the way the kids used to play it, in Duluth. And Bayfront is the perfect venue.

It also, of course, was the perfect venue for the six-band Saturday music show, climaxed by a nearly two-hour set by Trampled By Turtles. They did old songs, new songs, and finished with a multiple-song encore that featured the Grateful Dead’s “Touch of Grey,” and a strong version of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah.”
Legend has it that the five members of Trampled By Turtles got together while attending UMD. Tim Saxhaug, a Grand Rapids native and bass player in the band, said that was mostly legend.

“Banjo Dave [Carroll] was still going to UMD, but the rest of us had finished college and were just around here playing in different groups,” said Saxhaug, who still lives in Duluth.

The music scene in Duluth in those days generally featured a lot of people playing in an ever-increasing number of bands, and as they get to know each other, a definite chemistry sort of just coagulated among Saxhaug and Dave Simonette, guitar player, and singer-songwriter, who was playing in a duo that included Erik Berry, the mandolin player. Dave Carroll got to know the guys, and his banjo became another part, and Ryan Young and his amazing fiddle, joined in later.

The group developed an instant flair for up-tempo, modern-bluegrass style music, each writing in the parts for the different instruments. With lyrics that are far beyond any traditional bluegrass, Trampled developed a cult following among Duluth music-goers, and the word spread throughout Northern Minnesota. Next came the Twin Cities, then the Pacific Northwest.

Everywhere they went, they were a hit. They played the David Letterman show twice, Garrison Keillor’s Prairie Home Companion, Mountain Stage, and continued to gather together for occasional, and then frequent, concert runs.

Last week, they played the Winnipeg Folk Festival Thursday, a concert in Bismarck, N.D., Friday, then Bayfront on Saturday. They’re off for Vancouver, then Seattle this weekend.

Those who watched Trampled By Turtles last summer in a torrential rainstorm and a show-stopping lightning show, recall it as a highlight, as do the Turtles. Fans were told to disperse, and allowed to go into nearby AMSOIL Arena while lightning strikes got nearer and more frequent. When the lightning passed to the East, we went back out in the rain, and Trampled By Turtles played a stirring remainder to the concert. The rain never stopped, but the lightning moved on.

This year, perfect weather that ranged from about 72 to 67 through the night with no threat of rain, gave the band the green light, and they made the most of it.
This summer, we’ve got a few more music shows to go, including the Bayfront Bluesfest. No, technically they’re not sports events, but they can keep Bayfront jumping until we can get our outdoor high school hockey doubleheader up and running in February