Ever since Target Field opened in 2010, with its sweeping, open-air views of the Minneapolis skyline, baseball officials, with a tinge of gallows humor, have braced themselves for the possibility of late-October/early-November playoff games in a city where the average lows for those months are 40 and 26 degrees, respectively. One year, it stood to reason, the Minnesota Twins were going to be good enough to make it happen.
That year may have arrived. The Twins returned home this weekend — on the heels of a 16-7 win Thursday at the Los Angeles Angels, in which they tied a team record with eight home runs — with the best record in baseball, at 33-16, and the largest division lead, eight games over American League Central rival Cleveland, of any first-place team.