Monthly Archives: January 2019

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–January 19

Chick Gandil (1888)
Lee Head (1899)
Rip Radcliff (1906)
Chet Trail (1944)
Jon Matlack (1950)
Rich Gale (1954)
Brad Mills (1957)
Rick Adair (1958)
Chris Sabo (1962)
Jim Morris (1964)
Orlando Palmeiro (1969)
Jeff Juden (1971)
Phil Nevin (1971)
Chris Stynes (1973)
Amaury Telemaco (1974)
Byung-Hyun Kim (1979)
James Beresford (1989)
Nick Burdi (1993)

Lee Head played in the minors for twenty-one seasons.  He batted .304, but he was best known for his ability to avoid striking out.  In 1933 he struck out three times in 468 at-bats.  In 1935 he did even better, striking out once in 402 at-bats.

Chet Trail is the only player to have been on a World Series roster who never appeared in a major league game, regular season or post-season.  He is also the last man to make an out against Satchel Paige in an organized baseball game while playing in the Carolina League in 1966.  After baseball, he became a pastor and eventually a bishop in the Church of God in Christ.

Third baseman Brad Mills was drafted by Minnesota in the 16th round of the 1977 January draft, but did not sign.

Rick Adair was in baseball from 1979-2013.  Most recently, he was the pitching coach of the Baltimore Orioles.  He is the nephew of former Twins pitching coach Art Fowler.

Continue reading Happy Birthday–January 19 →

Friday Music Day

FMD – You’re My Favorite DJ

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First of all, sign up.

Secondly, who is/was your favorite DJ? Honestly, I haven't really listened to music on the radio in close to 20 years now (I could name some of my favorite NPR commentators!) so no one current comes to mind. Was racking my brain trying to think of one from my past, but no one really floated to the top. I think I liked John Hines as a kid, but now he's like a right wing talk radio guy?

Keeping Track

1969 Rewind: Game One Hundred Eight

MINNESOTA 7, DETROIT 1 IN DETROIT

Date:  Monday, August 4.

Batting star:  Tony Oliva was 3-for-4 with two RBIs.

Pitching stars:  Bob Miller pitched 7.1 innings, giving up one run on four hits and a walk and striking out two.  Ron Perranoski pitched 1.2 scoreless innings, giving up a walk.

Opposition stars:  Don Wert was 2-for-3.  Daryl Patterson struck out two in a perfect inning.

The game:  The Twins scored five in the first inning and the game was pretty much over right there.  Cesar Tovar walked, Rod Carew singled, and Harmon Killebrew walked, loading the bases.  Oliva hit an RBI ground out and Bob Allison struck out, so it looked like Tigers starter Mike Kilkenny might get out of the inning.  Leo Cardenas walked, re-loading the bases.  Rick Renick then followed with a two-run double and Tom Tischinski came through with a two-run single, making the score 5-0.

The Tigers threatened in the bottom of the first, as Tom Tresh hit a one-out double and Al Kaline walked, but Norm Cash hit into a double play.  They did got on the board in the third when Wert singled, went to second on a ground out, and scored on a Mickey Stanley double, making the score 5-1.  The Twins got the run back in the fifth when Carew walked, went to second on a wild pitch, and scored on Killebrew's single, so the score was 6-1.

The Twins added one last run in the seventh when Tovar singled, stole second, and scored on Oliva's single.  Detroit had only one hit after the third inning.

WP:  Miller (4-4).  LP:  Kilkenny (1-2).  S:  Perranoski (21).

Notes:  Tischinski was again behind the plate--one assumes Johnny Roseboro had a minor injury.  Renick was again at third, with Killebrew at first and Rich Reese on the bench.

Miller would make one more start, then miss a month due to injury.  He was in the bullpen when he came back, although he did make two starts at the end of the season.

Carew was 1-for-4 with a walk and was batting .366.  Oliva raised his average to .332.  Reese came into the game to pinch-hit for Allison in the fifth and went 0-for-2, making his average .318.  Reese first went to left, then moved to first when Ted Uhlaender came in for defense in the seventh, with Killebrew coming out of the game.

I had completely forgotten that Tom Tresh played for the Tigers.  He didn't play for them terribly long--he was traded there in mid-June of 1969 and stayed through the end of the season, which turned out to be his last.  The rest of his career, of course, was with the Yankees.  He made his major league debut as a September call-up in 1961 and stayed until his trade to Detroit.  He came up as a shortstop and played there in 1962, but then Tony Kubek got came back from the military and he moved to the outfield.  He played mostly left, but also played a good deal of center whenever Mickey Mantle missed time with injuries.  He was a very good batter through 1966, three times posting an OPS of .800 or better and around. 750 the other two times.  As we often say, those numbers are even better than they sound when you adjust for the low offense of the 1960s.  He was Rookie of the Year in 1962, made the all-star team in both 1962 and 1963, and won a Gold Glove in 1965.  After that, even though he was only twenty-eight in 1967, he pretty much fell off a cliff.  His OPS was .678 in 1967 and .612 in 1968.  It was .534 in 1969 at the time of his trade to the Tigers.  Detroit moved him back to shortstop and he bounced back some the rest of the season, but it wasn't enough.  He was released before the 1970 season, ending his playing career.  Tom Tresh passed away from a heart attack on October 14, 2008.

Record:  The Twins were 67-41, in first place in the American League West, 3.5 games ahead of Oakland.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–January 18

Eddie Moore (1899)
Danny Kaye (1913)
Mike Fornieles (1932)
Chuck Cottier (1936)
Satch Davidson (1936)
Curt Flood (1938)
Carl Morton (1944)
Billy Grabarkewitz (1946)
Sachio Kinugasa (1947)
Scott McGregor (1954)
Dave Geisel (1955)
Brady Anderson (1964)
Mike Lieberthal (1972)
Wandy Rodriguez (1979)
Michael Pineda (1989)

Entertainer Danny Kaye was one of the original owners of the Seattle Mariners.

Satch Davidson was a National League umpire from 1969-1984.

Sachio Kinusaga played in 2,215 games in Japan from 1970-1987.

Six players born on this day made their major league debuts in 2017:  Jaycob Brugman, Max Fried, Jarlin Garcia, Kyle Martin, Alex Mejia, and Gift Ngoepe.  I don't know, but I suspect this may be a record.

We would also like to wish a happy birthday to Scot's oldest son.

Continue reading Happy Birthday–January 18 →

Keeping Track

1969 Rewind: Game One Hundred Seven

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MINNESOTA 5, BALTIMORE 2 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Sunday, August 3.

Batting stars:  Tony Oliva was 2-for-4.  Leo Cardenas was 2-for-4.  Rich Reese was 1-for-1 with a grand slam (his eleventh home run).

Pitching star:  Jim Kaat pitched seven innings, giving up one run on five hits and three walks and striking out five.

Opposition stars:  Andy Etchebarren was 2-for-3.  Paul Blair was 1-for-4 with a home run, his twenty-first.

The game:  Harmon Killebrew hit a two-out double in the first, but he was thrown out trying to score on Oliva's single.  He was the only man to get past first base until the fourth, when Merv Rettenmund and Boog Powell opened with singles to put men on first and third.  Brooks Robinson then hit into a double play to give the Orioles a 1-0 lead.  Baltimore then loaded the bases, as two walks sandwiched a single, but Dave McNally grounded out to end the inning.

It looked like the one run might be enough.  Through six innings, the Twins had just four hits and, again, had just one man get past first base.  Their first two men went out in the seventh as well.  Then, however, Cardenas and Frank Quilici singled and Rick Renick pinch-hit and walked, loading the bases.  Reese then pinch-hit for Kaat and hit a grand slam, giving the Twins a 4-1 lead.

Paul Blair led off the eighth with a home run to cut the lead to 4-2, but that was as close as the Orioles would come.  The Twins added a run in the eighth when Rod Carew singled, went to second on a ground out, and scored on an Oliva single.

WP:  Kaat (11-7).  LP:  McNally (15-1).  S:  Al Worthington (2).

Notes:  This was a rather historic game at the time.  As you can see, it was the first loss of the season for McNally.  Had he won, he would've set an American League record with sixteen consecutive wins to start the season and eighteen consecutive wins including the previous season.  Your author remembers being sick this Sunday afternoon, listening to the game on the radio, and feeling much better after the Reese grand slam.

Bob Allison was again in left.  Frank Quilici was at third base, with Killebrew at first and Reese again on the bench.  Tom Tischinski was behind the plate--apparently George Mitterwald was gone for two weeks to fulfill a military reserve obligation, leaving Tischinski as the backup to Johnny Roseboro.  Renick pinch-hit for Tischinski in the seventh, with Roseboro coming in to catch in the eighth.

Carew was 1-for-4 and was batting .368.  Oliva raised his average to .328.  Reese was batting .320.  Kaat had his ERA drop to 2.86.

While McNally was obviously a fine pitcher, he had not always blown the opposition away during his streak.  He had five starts of four innings or fewer.  He also gave up four runs or more in five of the starts.  His teammates scored more than five runs in nine of his starts.  Again, McNally was a fine pitcher, but a streak like this always involves some luck, too.

Record:  The Twins were 66-41, in first place in the American League West, three games ahead of Oakland.