Notes, quotes and comment

The less said about the details of Tuesday's Astros-Twins game the better.

But Michael Pineda and company made Jake Odorizzi's performance on Monday shine even more.

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John Curtiss, shipped by the Twins to Anaheim before spring training for a minor leaguer who doesn't have to be on the 40-man roster, was designated for assignment by the Angels. He got into one major league game for the Halos and walked three of the 12 men he faced in that performance.

Daniel Ozoria, the 18-year-old infielder the Twins got for Curtiss, is presumably still in extended spring training awaiting the opening of either the Appy League or the Florida State League.

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USA Today this morning printed a Bob Nightengale piece (it appeared online earlier in the week) that is a really good example of a journalistic genre that I think of as "the suck-up story." Today's topic is Joe Maddon, the Cubs manager. Maddon is on the last year of his contract, and his bosses are being very obvious about not talking to him about an extension, and Nightengale can't for the life of him see why that might be the case.

Nightengale's probably not really that oblivious, but the point of that story is less to inform the reader than to make Maddon think more fondly of the national reporter than the local beat writers. That makes Maddon more likely to tip off Nightengale first if and when the ax falls -- or he gets that extension offer.

Anyway ... Nightengale says Maddon. always a lineup tinkerer, is telling his players the lineups a series in advance -- "yes, even before MLB's gambling sponsors know."

He's gonna get in trouble with the commissioner's office for that. Imagine, a manager prioritizing his team over the legal bookies. That's a violation!