Gardy is still stupid, and I'm scared of the new park

The Twins won last night, in fairly dramatic fashion, so I guess I shouldn't complain too much.
But I'm pissed off.
It was a very poorly managed game by Ron Gardenhire.

For starters, I don't understand how a guy can complain that his bullpen is overworked, and then consistently treat his starters like they're in 4th grade.
The maximum pitch count that Gardy will allow continues to decline; 90 appears to be the limit right now.
There was no reason to waste an inning of Joe Nathan Wednesday night, with Ramon Ortiz having thrown only 92 pitches through 8, and while the decision to pull Carlos Silva, who pitched brilliantly for the second straight start, is at least defensible from a strategic standpoint (the tying run was at the plate, and a lefty, and Denny Reyes did the job), but still, Silva had plenty of bullets left in the tank.
The argument that pulling a guy an inning early in April will benefit them in September is total bullshit. If he's tired, even a little, then yeah, pull him, and that will make a difference in September. But if a guy isn't tired, you're not saving anything, you're just being way overly cautious and making extra moves. How come nobody ever worries about the bullpen being overworked? It's a stupid double-standard that Gardy seems to have not even considered.

But that isn't even really what pissed me off last night, it was the decision to bring in Juan Rincon in the 8th. I know Rincon is typically Mr.8th inning, but he hasn't pitched since the opening series, thanks to first a sore neck and then a death in the family.
It was completely expected that he'd be rusty and possibly ineffective, but Gardy went ahead and brought him into a close ball game. If it was 5-0 or 6-0 it would've been a great time to go to Rincon. But when one run can decide a game, go to a guy (Pat Neshek) who's fresh and ready to go.
Almost on cue, Rincon served up a homer, a hit and a walk (though the ball 4 pitch to Dioner Navarro should've been strike 3).

This would've seemed like a good time to go to Neshek, since it was clear that Rincon was off, but Gardy still waited for him to give up the lead (and cost Silva a well-deserved win) before making the move.
And then, on cue, Neshek fanned the next two hitters effortlessly to get out of the inning.

Still Gardy wasn't done, choosing not to leave Neshek in, and bringing in Nathan.
Anyone who's read this blog more than a couple times knows my feelings on using Joe in a non-save situation. He almost always blows up. He's simply not a good pitcher unless he's protecting a lead.
On cue, he gives up a single and double, only to be miraculously bailed out by what is easily the worst and most bizarre baserunning I've ever seen at the Major League level.
The Twins won in the bottom of the 9th on another oppo dong from Justin Morneau, and while that was great, all it did for me was bail out Gardy, and overshadow the fact that he spent the whole night making stupid decisions.

*Again, kudos to Silva, who was solid. I actually thought he was better in Chicago, when his sinker was moving all over the place, but against the D-Rays he was effective in part because of a surprisingly nasty changeup. Has the Silva of old returned? I wouldn't go that far yet, but I think I actually think he's more likely to be for real than Ortiz.

*New stadium designs are out. If you haven't seen them go to twinsbaseball.com and prepare to be bombarded.
I was a little disappointed, because the team tried to make a big unveiling about it, but they're the same damn pictures we've been looking at for a few years.
Having said that, the Twins seem to know what they want to do here. The fact that the stadium seemed like little more than a pipe dream for so long means they're not going to screw it up. I know how much time they've spend surveying and researching, and I'm pretty confident that the new stadium will immediately rank among the best in baseball.
I like the idea of giving it some sort of unique characteristic, i.e. - the fountains in KC, the Riverboat in Cincy, the rocks in Anaheim. I've heard talk of planting a bunch of indigenous trees inside the park, and I think that could potentially be really cool so long as it doesn't interfere with sightlines.
My personal idea was a lake (10,000 lakes ballpark?), which could actually be stocked with fish, and then kids (and only kids) could fish during the game. But I realize that might be logistically difficult.

My one major fear of the new park is the potential corporateization of the Twins.
For as much abuse as the Dome takes, there's one thing that makes it great: the fact that you have to want to be there.
You know that whether its a crowd of 15,000 or 50,000 - the people there are Twins fans. It's not a hangout, or a chic place to be seen, which actually creates a great atmosphere. It weeds out the D-bags. That's why the place can get so loud. It's full of baseball fans, not suits and stiffs who bought corporate season ticket packages.
You can walk right up to the Dome most nights, and buy seats that are pretty close to the action for a decent price.
I fear, in fact I'm almost sure, that won't be the case for at least the first 10 years of the new ballpark.
Am I, a loyal fan who attends up to 8-10 games a year in the Dome, going to pay $25 to sit in the nosebleeds while some boner-nose big whig who wouldn't know a triple play from a triple axle sits in the box seats at $60 a pop (with a group of 10 other self-important white collar pricks and their prozac wives in tow)?
My guess is the answer is yes.