Umpire bashing is too easy. Still: 'C'mon, Phil Cuzzi. Those pitches weren't close'

A weakness of the human mind condemns us to retain painful memories more than pleasant ones — and to make decisions that often minimize the risk of pain rather than maximizing the opportunity for reward.

This can be useful at times. But it is not particularly fun when you are a Minnesota sports fan.

Playoff games carry expectations of misery instead of optimism. And human mistakes — particularly by umpires, referees, officials, name the sport — become fodder for vast conspiracy theories instead of being tossed in a pile with the assumption that everything will even itself out.

With all that said, and with the understanding that complaining about calls that go against Minnesota teams can be the lowest of low-hanging fruit ...

Come on, Phil Cuzzi. Those were not even close to strikes.

As I talked about on Tuesday's Daily Delivery podcast, the Twins' old nemesis was at it again during Monday's 9-8, 12 inning loss to the Dodgers.

Cuzzi, who lives in infamy with many Twins fans because of his blown call on a would-be double by Joe Mauer in the 2009 ALDS, was behind the plate Monday.

Pitch 1: Definitely outside by a few inches and maybe a little high, too. Cuzzi called it a strike, which is a huge advantage for the pitcher. The next pitch was a foul ball, so Kirilloff was suddenly in an 0-2 hole.

Pitch 3: Definitely inside by a couple inches. Cuzzi called it strike three. The Dodgers got out of the inning without any more damage, tied the score in the bottom half and won in the 12th.

How much damage was done? The excellent Twitter feed Umpire Scorecards notes that Cuzzi not only had an overall negative accuracy score from Monday's game, but that his missed calls cost the Twins 1.4 runs. That seems significant in a one-run game.

It was the type of sequence that makes you want "robo umps" to arrive in MLB as soon as possible instead of just at Class AAA.

And it was plenty frustrating for the Twins, who have now lost 11 in a row to the Dodgers.

*Nuggets vs. Lakers in the Western Conference Finals starts Tuesday night. It's a real "what-if" series for the Wolves, featuring the teams they lost to in the playoffs and the first play-in game.

*Dallas, meanwhile, hung on to avoid the series upset with a 2-1 Game 7 win over Seattle. So the teams that eliminated the Wild and Wolves, respectively, are in their conference finals.

*An interesting wrinkle to the NFL schedule is that one playoff game will be carried exclusively on the Peacock streaming service. It's the Saturday night Wild Card game, and it's the first time an NFL playoff game will be exclusively shown on a streaming service. Get used to this as the future of TV, as the revenue pie is divided up and maximized, not necessarily to the benefit or ease of viewers.