MINNESOTA 4, CLEVELAND 3 IN MINNESOTA
Date: Thursday, June 25.
Batting stars: Roy Smalley was 3-for-4 with a home run, his fifth. Dan Gladden was 2-for-4 with a home run, his fourth. Kent Hrbek was 1-for-4 with a two-run homer, his eighteenth.
Pitching stars: Bert Blyleven pitched six innings, giving up three runs on eight hits and five walks with four strikeouts. Jeff Reardon struck out four in two perfect innings.
Opposition stars: Phil Niekro pitched a complete game, giving up four runs eight hits and a walk with four strikeouts. Niekro was in his last year in the majors at age forty-eight. Chris Bando was 2-for-4 with a home run (his third) and three RBIs. Julio Franco was 2-for-3 with a walk and two stolen bases (his fifteenth and sixteenth).
The game: Gladden hit a solo homer and Hrbek a two-run shot in the first inning, putting the Twins up 3-0. Bando singled in a run in the second, but Smalley homered leading off the fourth to give the Twins a three-run lead again at 4-1. In the sixth, Blyleven left a pitch up to Bando, who hit a two-run homer to make it 4-3. The Indians did not get a hit after that, though, as George Frazier pitched a scoreless inning, giving up only a walk, and Reardon gave up absolutely nothing in the last two innings.
Of note: Kirby Puckett was 1-for-4 with a run and was batting .338...Reardon got his ERA below six for the first time since May 7, at 5.79.
Record: The Twins had won four in a row and were 42-29, in first place, 4.5 games ahead of Oakland.
Notes: Al Newman was at shorstop, replacing Greg Gagne, and batted second. He went 0-for-4, making his average .205.
Player profile: Sal Bando's brother, Chris Bando had a fairly substantial career as a part-time catcher. The Indians drafted him in the second round in 1978. He came to the big leagues in August of 1981 and was there to stay with the exception of a couple of months in 1984. Oddly, 1984 would be his best year, as he batted .291/.377/.505 with twelve home runs, more than double the number he hit in any other season and nearly half of his career total. He would usually have between 150 and 250 at-bats in a season, with his highest total being 254 in 1986. He was with the Indians until August of 1988, when he was released. He would play two more games in the majors, one with Detroit in 1988 and the other with Oakland in 1989. He was a minor league manager for ten seasons and also has coached in college, spending several seasons at San Diego Christian College. At last report, he was helping coach at Southwestern College and was coaching the Action Baseball Club. He also is the founder of Athletes Abroad for Christ, whose goal is to "glorify God through the arena of athletics, by preaching the Gospel and encouraging a faithful commitment to a local church”.
This was Phil Niekro's last complete game. However, his longest outing of 1987 was the start after this one, when he went 8.2 innings in a 2-1 victory over California. He actually carried a 2-0 shutout two outs into the ninth, then gave up two singles and hit the next batter. Swingman Scott Bailes came in to relieve Knucksie and gave up so single to pinch-hitter George Hendrick before striking out pinch hitter Butch Wynegar.
All the Twins' runs scored on dongers. Huh.
This caught my eye: 18 HR's by June 25th(!) so I had to look. Hrbie finished with a career high & team-leading* 34.
*Gaetti & Bruno also both topped 30 in '87. Cool!
TK had great righty/lefty combos in his lineup and the boppers fed off of it.
I have to remind myself at times that this info can be news to people here. While I was only 6 during that season, we had RBI Baseball for the NES and I memorized every stat for every player. While some of that has faded, I'll never forget 34, 32, 31, 28.
Yeah ... that was not my world. It seems my Dad was a fan of Braves while he was growing up, but pro sports & sports watching wasn't a big part of my childhood. I 'liked' the Twins and going to games at the Dome was always a big deal, but I didn't really have a clue what I was watching. 1987 was probably the first year I even knew that a "World Series" was a thing, but even now, I can't tell you that I remember watching the games.
I loved playing ball. I played from 1st grade through age 17 - VFW/Legion instead of school ball those last few years - but it was just a game; something fun to do and I liked team sports. However, if I'm being honest, I didn't really learn to appreciate baseball (the execution, the strategy, the nuance of a pitch or a pitch sequence, the value of stats beyond the 'counters' ... even the game's history and players) until I was closer to 30 than 20.
Case in point, I didn't know that Hrbek hit 34 HR's in '87, or in any other year for that matter. Nor did I comprehend how that compares to what Killebrew did with the bat.
I recall that my favorite sport as a kiNdergartner was football (I had and loved a short with the front four defensive line - Noga, DOleman, Thomas, and Millard (I had to look up Millard)), but 1991 was the year for me. My dad let me stay up to watch the end of games six and seven. I was apparently in attendance for one of the AL S games in 1987, but I remember none of it. 1991 made me a fan for life.
It would be awesome if the Twins would get their affairs in order so that I could have a similar ethical quandary of whether to let my son stay up til 11 on a school night.
ININDOTMMIIII?