M’s enter altered state of consciousness, drop snoozer to the Royals

Today’s game in Peoria was a dreamlike affair, though not in the positive sense of wish-fulfillment; there was virtually none of that unless you’re a big Torrens (2-for-3, 2 RBI) believer. All the various ways dreams lack consistent logic or any apparent linearity could be found in this afternoon’s 11-4 loss to the Royals. In fact, all one could really latch on to were loosely-associated images and half-remembered (if not fictitious) faces.

The lethargic, chaotic energy that filled the stadium today is perhaps best summarized by this image of a bespectacled Chris Flexen tossing sunflower seeds at George Kirby as the latter answers the broadcast booth’s questions with the terseness of a Trappist.

Without glancing at my notes, it’s much easier to tell you who all ROOT interviewed than who brought home each of today’s 4 runs. I seem to recall the blurry outlines of a large brass instrument, a heavy rain, and a black eye. In consulting with my preferred oneiramancer, I’ve determined these cryptic symbols mean RBIs from Steven Souza Jr., Luis Torrens, and Jake Scheiner, only one of whom is even lightly guaranteed a spot on the roster come the end of spring training.

If anything in this game held relevance to the season ahead it would be the discrepancy between the start and finish of Logan’s outing. While it never looked as promising as his first of the spring, the first three innings were on the whole a pleasant affair, with his ostensibly new and improved curveball even garnering praise from Rob Friedman of Pitching Ninja (anyone else’s ears burning from the attention he’s been giving the M’s lately?):

Ultimately a “see what happens” curve to Kyle Isbel got a bit hung up, resulting in a dinger and the end of his day at 65 pitches, with his fastball dipping down to a “mere” 95 by that point. The relief corps that covered the majority of the game was not particularly stellar, though to his credit, Justus Sheffield in long relief managed two 1-2-3 innings sandwiched around a minor implosion that gave him approximately a million earned runs.

An individual, allegedly a Seattle Mariner, named Bryan Pall actually gave up the hit that scored the majority of those runs, but because this was a dream, Justus managed to sneak back out there for another inning after having been so “relieved”.

With the score 9-1 by the home 7th, and because any sense of normalcy had been suspended, the Mariners’ collective unconscious decided it would be funny if their boss’ kid came out to pitch against them.

In the end, the joke was on them, seeing as the younger Dipoto made outs of 2 Mariners and something called a “Riley Unroe”. I can take a little bit of REM sleep scrambling of familiar people, but in the future I hope when the Mariners sleep through games, their dreams don’t include so many obviously made-up names and faces.

Maybe they’ll even be awake for tomorrow’s game against the Cubs.