Bill Rariden (1888)
Max Flack (1890)
Roger Peckinpaugh (1891)
Joan Payson (1903)
Jack Murphy (1923)
Don Hoak (1928) Al Worthington (1929) Hank Aaron (1934) Norm Miller (1946)
Mike Heath (1955) Roberto Alomar (1968) Eric O'Flaherty (1985) Mark Hamburger (1987)
Joan Payson was the original owner of the New York Mets.
Jack Murphy was a longtime sportswriter in San Diego who helped bring the Padres to the city. The baseball stadium was named in his honor for many years until the naming rights were sold.
Batting stars: Mike Pagliarulo was 2-for-4 with a three-run homer, his fifth. Kent Hrbek was 2-for-4 with a two-run homer (his fourteenth), a double, and two runs. Kirby Puckett was 2-for-4 with a home run (his thirteenth) and two runs. Brian Harper was 2-for-4. Shane Mack was 2-for-4.
Pitching star: Steve Bedrosian pitched three innings, giving up one run on two hits and two walks and striking out two.
Opposition stars: Brook Jacoby was 3-for-5. Terry Steinbach was 2-for-4. Jose Canseco was 2-for-5 with a home run (his thirty-fifth) and two runs. Rickey Henderson was 1-for-3 with a three-run homer (his eleventh) and two walks. Joe Klink pitched 2.1 scoreless innings, giving up three hits and a walk and striking out one.
The game: Canseco hit a two-out homer in the top of the first to give the Athletics a 1-0 lead. Puckett responded with a two-out homer in the bottom of the first to tie it 1-1. There was no more scoring until the fourth, when Oakland exploded for five runs. Terry Steinbach started the inning with a walk. Jacoby singled and Brad Komminsk had an RBI single to give the Athletics the lead. Mark McGwire walked to load the bases. With one out, Mike Bordick laid down a squeeze bunt. Rickey Henderson followed with a three-run homer to give Oakland a 6-1 lead.
The Twins came right back in the bottom of the fourth. With one out, Hrbek and Chili Davis hit back-to-back doubles to score one run. Harper singled, but Davis was thrown out at the plate. Undaunted, Mack singled and Pagliarulo hit a three-run homer to cut the Athletics' lead to 6-5.
In the fifth, singles by Canseco, Jacoby, and McGwire plated a run to make it 7-5. In the bottom of the fifth Knoblauch walked and Hrbek hit a two-run homer to tie it 7-7.
There was no more scoring until the ninth. With one out, Dave Henderson walked. He went to second on a ground out and Steinbach delivered an RBI single to give Oakland an 8-7 lead. In the bottom of the ninth Randy Bush hit a pinch-hit one-out double, but a ground out and a pop up ended the game.
WP: Klink (9-3). LP: Steve Bedrosian (4-3). S: Dennis Eckersley (34).
Notes: Dan Gladden was on the bench for this game. Mack moved to left and Gene Larkin went to right. Knoblauch moved up to the leadoff spot and Larkin batted second. Al Newman was at shortstop in Greg Gagne's place.
Bush pinch-hit for Newman in the ninth. Scott Leius then pinch-ran for Bush.
Puckett raised his average to .328. Harper went up to .306. Mack got over .300 for the first time all season at .301.
David West started and lasted just 3.2 innings, allowing six runs on six hits and three walks. He struck out four. Terry Leach gave up one run in 2.1 innings to make his ERA 2.78.
The Athletics' starter was Joe Slusarski. He pitched four innings and also allowed six runs. He gave up seven hits and and one walk with one strikeout.
You may remember Brad Komminsk--he was a can't-miss prospect who missed. The Braves took him with the fourth pick of the 1979 draft. He tore up the minors and made his major league debut with Atlanta in mid-August of 1983. He batted .222 in 36 at-bats, but he was only twenty-two. He was doing well in AAA in 1984, came up to the majors at the end of May, and batted .203 in 301 at-bats. He stuck with the Braves the entire 1985 season, but batted just .227. He did draw a fair number of walks, but not enough to offset his low average. Also, he was supposed to be a power hitter, and he was in the minors, but his high in home runs for Atlanta was eight in 1984. He was with the Braves through 1986, was with Milwaukee in 1987, was in the minors all of 1988, played for Cleveland in 1989, was with Baltimore and San Francisco in 1990, and was with Oakland in 1991. He hit well in AAA, but for some reason could not translate that to the majors. It's true that he rarely got regular playing time--his high in at-bats in a season was 301--but it's also true that he never showed he deserved it. For his career, in 1119 plate appearances, he batted .218/.301/.336 with 23 home runs. He was in AAA with the White Sox in 1992-1993, played in the Northern League in 1996, and played one game of AAA for Detroit in 1997. He was a long-time minor league coach and manager.
The White Sox lost to Detroit 3-2, so the Twins maintained their lead.
Record: The Twins were 71-49, in first place in the American League West, 3.5 games ahead of Chicago.
In the upper reaches of this list we may hit larger strings of songs that've already been played once (or twice), like Mitski's "Your Best American Girl", Car Seat Headrest's "Drunk Drivers/Killer Whales" and Grizzly Bear's "Yet Again"
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After going without it for a year, I finally got a little status back with the airlines. The resentment from my forced exile was somewhat abated by getting bumped up for both legs of a connecting flight back to ORD. Oh, how I missed dat status.
Germany Schaefer (1876)
Eddie Ainsmith (1890)
Possum Whitted (1890)
Joe Sparma (1942) Steve Brye (1949)
Rob Picciolo (1953) Rusty Kuntz (1955)
Chris Bando (1956)
Dan Plesac (1962)
Chris Coste (1973) Ben Hendrickson (1981) Doug Fister (1984)
Reno Bertoia came to Minnesota with the Twins in 1961, and brought the number he had worn with the Senators along in his suitcase. (Born in Italy as "Pierino," he is the only "Reno" to play in MLB.) Bertoia was the starting third baseman in the Twins' first game; they defeated the Yankees 6-0 at Old Yankee Stadium. He played 35 games, then was traded on 01 June with Golden Gopher Heismann runner-up Paul Giel — a native of Winona, Minn — to Kansas City. The same day, Milwaukee traded Billy Martin to the Twins. Both men were listed at 5' 11"; Martin took over the number. While Martin has more to his story than just that, both men are exemplars of one of the primary types of player to wear this number: banjo-hitting infielders. Another group — banjo-hitting, fleet-footed outfielders — reached its fullest expression in the late Eighties to late Nineties.
Martin, of course, is known best for his exploits & altercations while manager of the '69 Twins, who finished first in the new AL West during his only year at the helm. Much could be said about Billy Martin; suffice it to say he's a significant character in the story of the Twins' greatest period of dominance.
No Twin wore Nº 1 in 1962, but after Bernie Allen picked it back up midway through the 1963 season, the number stayed in circulation until 1970. Eric Soderholm wore it for two seasons with a 72 OPS+ over 391 PA, then switched numbers and put up a 117 OPS+ over his last remaining 1136 PA as a Twin. The guys who came after Soderholm didn't find any better success wearing it, and then Twins didn't issue the number to anyone in 1979. In 1982, Ray Smith became the first — and so far, only — catcher to wear Nº 1 for the Twins.
After another break in 1987, John Moses was issued the number and started the above-mentioned run of fast, light-hitting outfielders that ended with Otis Nixon. Moses had his career year in '88, an okay year in '89, and, along with the rest of the team, crashed to Earth hard in '90. Jarvis Brown wore Nº 1 in 1991. Had Gene Larkin not pinch-hit for him in the bottom of the tenth in Game 7, Brown might be the least-remembered position player on the Twins '91 World Series roster. (We'll get to the guy who could claim that title later in this series.) Alex Cole brought Nº 1 back into circulation with a solid year in 1994, batting .296/.375/.403 (102 OPS+) over 398 PA, with 15 doubles, 5 triples, and 29 stolen bases (78% success rate). Cole was the Twins' first primary center fielder following Kirby's move to right field, but unfortunately for him, his incumbency lasted only lasted one year. He was off to a solid start in 1995, but must've gotten injured; he missed every game from 01 June through 22 September, and apparently did not play in the minors. Three seasons later, Nº 1 was issued to Otis Nixon, who had worn the same number in Atlanta. By the time he reached the Twins, Nixon was just two years younger than Billy Martin was when he became the manager of the 1969 Twins. Nixon stole 37 bases — with an 84% success rate! — for the Twins, which nearly doubled the franchise's previous high water mark for a player 39 years old or older. (Lave Cross stole 19 bases in his age 40 season for the 1906 Senators. Paul Molitor held the post-relocation record, with 18 in 1996.)
The past twenty years have seen Nº 1 alternate between Gardenhire-era second basemen and fifth outfielders — with one exception: Jason Kubel wore it as a September call-up by the 2004 Twins. Kubel looked really impressive, hitting .300/.358/.433 (.320 BAbip, 104 OPS+) over 67 PA. He was 22. After that first cup of coffee, Kubel blew out his knee in the Arizona Fall League. When he returned to the Twins in 2006, he did so wearing a different number. One wonders what might have been.
Whether Kubel wanted a new number or not, part of the reason he wasn't reissued Nº 1 was that Luis Castillo was wearing it. Castillo came to Minnesota in a December 2005 trade from Florida — where he had worn 1 since 1997 — to fill what had been a gaping hole for the Twins since the Chuck Knoblauch trade. Castillo put up 2.3 rWAR for the best post-Knoblauch season at the keystone in his first year, and followed it up with 1.4 rWAR the next before a deadline deal sent him to the Mets. The Twins proceeded to flail around again until Orlando Hudson signed a one-year free agent deal for 2010. O-Hud put up the best single season for the № 1 jersey (in what remains the single best post-Knoblauch season at second base), and the Twins won 94 games and repeated as AL Central champs in their first year in Target Field. Hudson was allowed to walk after the season, which turned out to be his last decent year. He was known to be a chatterbox, and — if Poultry Man is a credible source — complete wore out his welcome. The Twins elected to assign № 1 to their new second baseman, Tsuyoshi Nishioka, who came over from the Chiba Lotte Marines. Nishioka had won the batting title in his last year in Japan, which lended some excitement to the Twins' first acquisition from NPB. Six games into the season, Nick Swisher broke Nishioka's left fibula with a takeout slide. Nishioka missed all of May and half of June. The Twins lost 99 games, and General Manager Bill Smith was fired in November. After a poor showing in 2012, Nishioka asked for and was given his release, despite having a third year left on his contract. He returned to Japan and played for the Hanshin Tigers until 2018.
Nick Gordon wears № 1 for the Rochester Red Wings. He appears to be the successor to the Punch and Judy infielder line, but his future in the organization is more doubtful than his draft number once suggested. The frequency with which the Nº 1 is assigned to players has also dropped since its near-ubiquity from 1961–1995. Whether this is incidental or by design is hard to say. There are only ten single-digit numbers, and the Twins have already retired three of them. Whether the Twins have gotten more selective about who gets them remains to be seen in future installments.
Batting stars: Mike Pagliarulo was 2-for-3 with a walk. Shane Mack was 2-for-4. Kirby Puckett was 2-for-4.
Pitching stars: Carl Willis pitched five innings of relief, giving up one run on two hits and no walks and striking out four. Rick Aguilera pitched a perfect inning and struck out one.
Opposition stars: Dave Stewart pitched 6.2 innings, giving up three runs on seven hits and five walks and striking out five. Dave Henderson was 2-for-3 with a double, a walk, and two runs.
The game: The Athletics again took the early lead, scoring twice in the first inning. Rickey Henderson led off with a single and Dave Henderson walked. The Hendersons then pulled off a double steal-plus-error, with Rickey scoring and Dave going to third. A ground out scored Dave and gave Oakland a 2-0 lead. The Hendersons produced another run in the third when Rickey walked and scored from first on Dave's double.
The Twins got on the board in the bottom of the third when Dan Gladden walked and scored from first on Chuck Knoblauch's double. The Athletics got the run back in the sixth when Dave Henderson singled, went to third on a Jose Canseco single, and scored on a ground out. Just like yesterday, Oakland led 4-1.
The Twins got a pair of walks in the sixth but did not score. In the seventh, however, Mike Pagliarulo walked, Greg Gagne singled, and Dan Gladden was hit by a pitch, loading the bases. A sacrifice fly scored one run and Puckett singled home another, cutting the lead to 4-3. The Twins continued the comeback in the eighth. Chili Davis led off with a single and Brian Harper delivered an RBI triple, tying the score. Mack singled to put the Twins ahead. He went to third on a Pagliarulo single and scored on a ground out to give the Twins a 6-4 advantage. The Athletics went down in order in the ninth.
WP: Willis (7-2). LP: Rick Honeycutt (2-3). S: Aguilera (32).
Notes: Al Newman pinch-ran for Harper in the eighth. Gene Larkin pinch-hit for Gagne, also in the eighth. In the ninth, Newman went to shortstop and Junior Ortiz replaced Larkin and went behind the plate.
Puckett raised his average to .326. He was 6-for-14 in the series so far. Harper was 1-for-4 and was batting .304. Willis lowered his ERA to 1.93. Aguilera's ERA was 2.47.
Willie Banks started for the Twins but pitched just three innings, giving up three runs (two earned) on two hits and three walks and striking out one. His ERA was 6.28.
I've written about this before, but Carl Willis was an incredibly valuable pitcher for the Twins in 1991. Time after time, he came in and pitched multiple innings out of the bullpen. He either retained a lead or kept the Twins in the game over and over again, and saved the rest of the bullpen. He would wear down and have a poor September, but I think it's safe to say the Twins might well have not won the division without him.
Rick Honeycutt came up in 1977 with Seattle and had a fine career as a starter through 1986. He then moved to the bullpen and had a fine career as a reliever through 1996. For his career, he posted an ERA of 3.84 and a WHIP of 1.35 in 268 starts. He posted an ERA 3.36 and a WHIP of 1.22 in 529 relief appearances. He came up at age 23 and was in the majors until age 43. He made two all-star teams and led the league in ERA in 1983. Not a Hall-of-Famer or anything, but still, that's a career to be proud of.
Oakland entered this series trailing the Twins by four games. They now trailed by seven. The White Sox defeated the Yankees 11-3, so the gap between those two teams remained the same.
Record: The Twins were 71-48, in first place in the American League West, 3.5 games ahead of Chicago.
Lou Criger (1872)
Slim Sallee (1885) Larry MacPhail (1890) Joe Stripp (1903)
Buck Ross (1915)
Dick Tracewski (1935)
Joe Coleman (1947)
Bake McBride (1949)
Fred Lynn (1952)
Ronald Williamson (1953) Fred Toliver (1961) Joe Klink (1962) Scott Klingenbeck (1971)
Skip Schumaker (1980)
B. J. Garbe (1981) Lucas Duda (1986)
Larry MacPhail was the general manager of Cincinnati (1933-36) and Brooklyn (1938-42) and was president and part-owner of the Yankees (1946-47). His son Lee MacPhail was president of the American League and his grandson Andy MacPhail was the general manager of the Twins (1985-94) and the president of the Cubs (2000-02), the Orioles (2007-2015), and the Phillies (2015-present).
Ronald Williamson was a catcher in the Oakland organization from 1971-1973. In 1988, he was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death. He was cleared in 1999 through DNA testing and became the subject of John Grisham’s first non-fiction book, “The Innocent Man.” Williamson passed away from cirrhosis in 2004.
Outfielder B. J. Garbe was chosen by the Twins with the fifth pick of the 1999 draft. He was with the Twins through 2004, ended his career in 2006, and never got higher than AA.
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