MINNESOTA 4, KANSAS CITY 3 IN MINNESOTA (10 INNINGS)

Date:  Wednesday, June 10.

Batting stars:  Dan Gladden was 2-for-4 with a double and a walk, scoring once.  Greg Gagne was 1-for-1 with a stolen base (his third), scoring twice.  Mark Davidson was 1-for-3 with a walk and a run.

Pitching stars:  Bert Blyleven struck out nine in eight innings, giving up three runs (two earned) on five hits and three walks.  Jeff Reardon struck out two in two shutout innings, giving up two hits and a walk.

Opposition stars:  Charlie Liebrandt pitched 7.2 innings, giving up three unearned runs on three hits and four walks with three strikeouts.  Willie Wilson was 2-for-3 with a walk and two stolen bases (his sixteenth and seventeenth), scoring twice.  Bo Jackson was 1-for-4 with a home run, his twelfth.

The game:  The Royals scored single runs in the first and third to take a 2-0 lead.  In the sixth, Blyleven left a pitch up to Jackson to make it 3-0.  The Twins had two out and a man on first when Liebrandt walked Gladden and pinch-hitter Tim Laudner to load the bases.  Dan Quisenberry came in and got Kirby Puckett to ground one to first base, but Steve Balboni made an error and all three runs scored to tie the game.  The game went to extra innings.  Gagne led off the tenth with a single off Jerry Don Gleaton and stole second.  Gary Gaetti was intentionally walked, but Gene Larkin lined a single to left to win the game for the Twins.

Record:  The Twins were 32-26 and moved into first place, a game ahead of Kansas City.

Notes:  The win completed a sweep of Kansas City and gave the Twins five wins in a row...Al Newman made his fourth consecutive start at shortstop in place of Gagne, who came in as a pinch-runner in the eighth...Larkin made his second consecutive start at first base in place of Kent Hrbek, who presumably had a minor injury...Davidson was in right field, with Brunansky at DH and Roy Smalley out of the lineup.  I had no memory that Davidson played so much in 1987...Sal Butera caught, with Laudner coming in as a pinch-hitter in the eighth inning...Puckett was 0-for-5, dropping his average to .312...Larkin was 1-for-4 with a walk and an RBI and was batting .353.

Player profile:  Willie Wilson is another fine player from the 1980s who has kind of dropped off the radar screen.  He was a first round draft choice in 1974, got September call-ups in 1976 and 1977, and came up to stay in 1978.  He was mostly used as a reserve that year and didn't do much, but he won the starting left field job in 1979 and made the most of it, batting .315 with a league-leading 83 stolen bases.  It may seem odd that a man that fast was in left, but the Royals also had a fine center fielder in Amos Otis.  Wilson had an even better year in 1980, batting .326 and leading the league in runs, hits, and triples.  He finished fourth in the MVP voting that year, winning his only Gold Glove and one of his two Silver Slugger awards.  His best year may have been 1982, when he won his only batting title with a .332 average and again led the league in triples with 15.  He took over the center field job in 1983, when an aging Otis moved to right.  He held the job through 1990, when he became a free agent and signed with Oakland.  Now thirty-five, he really didn't do a lot in his two years with the Athletics.  He went to the Cubs in 1993 but was just a part-time player then until his release in May of 1994.  He had a pretty good run, though, making two all-star teams, getting votes for MVP four times, and leading the league in triples five times.  For his career, he batted .285/.326/.376 with 147 triples and 668 stolen bases (twelfth all time).  He also had thirteen inside-the-park home runs.