It was throwback night Tuesday at Target Field. The Twins executed a squeeze play, and the resulting cheers proved how much a fan base that loves small ball had been missing the little things. Nick Blackburn threw 127 pitches -- 16 more than his career-high. Biggest throwback of all? The Twins won. It was a very nice victory, and a fantastic effort from Blackburn. Knowing full well that Matt Capps and Joe Nathan were unavailable after overextending themselves (while coughing up a three-run lead the night before), Blackburn took the ball and never stopped throwing. He looked as sharp in the ninth as he did in the first. And again, not that fan influence should be the barometer of good baseball ... but the excitement level in the ninth inning when Blackburn climbed back on the hill was apparent even through a TV screen.

The only questions we had coming out of it were these:

*If the Twins have a philosophy that they rarely stray from (110 pitches is about the outer limit they let starters go typically, while Twins fans are conditioned to be surprised at every pitch over 100) because they believe keeping pitch counts down is better for pitchers, why does that change even out of relative necessity?

*And conversely, if Blackburn is allowed to throw 127 out of necessity, should he and other Twins pitchers -- when pitching effectively -- be given longer leashes and a few more pitches to go deeper into games even when the bullpen is at full strength?

The logical middle ground is to say last night was a special circumstance combining Blackburn's effectiveness and the bullpen's lack of sturdy arms, and that letting a starter stretch only occasionally while still keeping him on a tighter count in the majority of his starts will protect his arm and the team's best interests.

But there are many who argue that pitch count limitations are a bad modern development triggered by flawed data, and that increased workload does not lead to an increased risk of injury. This piece is several years old, but it hits at the heart of the debate. And this piece from Joe Posnanski and Bill James going back and forth in 2009 is particularly interesting to us. From James:

The problem with the move toward pitch counts was that there was never any logic or research that said that limiting a pitcher to 100 pitches would prevent injuries, as opposed to 130 pitches, or 130 for young pitchers and 160 for mature pitchers, or as opposed to getting the pitcher out of the game at the first sign of a problem, or as opposed to improving his training regimen. I am opposed to making decisions based on fear, and in favor of making decisions based on logic and research. ... I always admire people who have the courage to confront the conventional wisdom ... I mean, people within the system. Those of us on the outside ... it's easy for us to say whatever we think, because there are no consequences to it. It's much harder to say, "I think the conventional wisdom is full of beans, and I'm not going to go along with it," when you're inside the system and exposed to the possibility of actual failure. I think the people who do this drive the world to get better, whereas the people who snipe at anybody who dares suggest that the conventional wisdom is malarkey are, in my view, gutless conspirators in the mediocrity of the universe.

That might be a little more philosophical depth than you were looking for on a Wednesday morning after a nice Twins victory, but what do you think? Are we too obsessed with the round number of a pitch count? And furthermore, if Blackburn is allowed to throw 127 out of necessity, has he earned the privilege to do so more often?