MINNESOTA 4, TORONTO 3 IN TORONTO
Date: Friday, April 5.
Batting stars: David Ortiz was 2-for-5 with a two-run homer and a double. Doug Mientkiewicz was 2-for-4 with two doubles and a walk. Dustan Mohr was 2-for-3 with a triple, a walk, and a stolen base.
Pitching stars: Rick Reed pitched five innings, giving up two runs on three hits and two walks with three strikeouts. J. C. Romero struck out two in 1.1 perfect innings. Mike Jackson struck out two in 1.2 perfect innings.
Opposition stars: Felix Heredia struck out three in 2.1 scoreless innings, giving up a hit and three walks. Dave Berg hit a pinch-hit home run.
The game: The Twins jumped on Blue Jays starter Brandon Lyon, as Ortiz hit a two-run homer and Torii Hunter made it back-to-back homers, giving the Twins a 3-0 lead. Shannon Stewart led off the bottom of the first to make it 3-1, but the Twins got the run back in the second as Tom Prince scored from first on a single-plus-error by Jacque Jones. Carlos Delgado led off the fourth with a home run to cut the lead to 4-2. There was no more scoring until the ninth, when Berg led off with a pinch-hit homer to make it 4-3. A walk put the tying run on base, but a double play and a fly out ended the game.
WP: Reed. LP: Lyon. S: Eddie Guardado.
Notes: Luis Rivas was apparently injured in the second game of the season. He would not return until June 4. The Twins appear to have been auditioning candidates to replace him, as Jay Canizaro started at second yesterday and Warren Morris started this game, going 0-for-3...Prince replaced A. J. Pierzynski at catcher and was 1-for-4...All of the Toronto runs came on solo homers, by Stewart, Delgado, and Berg. It was the first homer of the season for each. I guess solo home runs don't hurt you...The Twins had several players batting well in the young season, as Mohr was batting .429, Jones .412, Mientkiewicz .375, and Ortiz .353. On the other end of the scale were Cristian Guzman at .077 and Corey Koskie at .063.
I remember Canizaro, but I suspect it was from his performance in 2000 and not for filling for Rivas this season. Second base was such a black hole for the Twins, partially of their own making, after Knoblauch was traded. In the fifteen years between Knoblauch’s departure & Dozier taking over in 2012, only four players accumulated at least 1.5 rWAR in a season while playing at least 50% of their games to the immediate right of the keystone. Only one managed that feat twice. Put another way, the Twins got fewer than 1.5 rWAR/season from their second basemen for a decade, including most of the years the team was in contention for division crowns. Here are those five seasons:
Todd Walker’s all-around best season came in 2002, when he accumulated 2.3 rWAR with Cincinnati. Beyond his time with the Twins, I can remember him playing for the Rockies, Red Sox, Cubs, and Padres, but have no memory of him with the Reds.
I'm thinking the top left of the cover illustration is Tony Fiore - who's the imp on the far left?
Matt Kinney, maybe? But he was pretty tall...
Looks kind of like Jack Cressend to me, but I really don't know.
That was my first thought.
He had the goatee in Twins uniformed photos. This smile and the way he wears the hat really seems to go with the caricature.
I really wish Topps had a baseball card of Kinney when he wore glasses -- they were of the Stephen King thickness.
So I 'm going with, from left to right, back row, Tony Fiore, LaTroy Hawkins, Mike Jackson; front row, Jack Cressend, J.C. Romero, Eddie Guardado and Bob Wells.