Monthly Archives: February 2020

Keeping Track

1991 Rewind: Game One Hundred Twenty-seven

MINNESOTA 5, CLEVELAND 3 IN CLEVELAND

Date:  Monday, August 26.

Batting stars:  Kirby Puckett was 2-for-4 with a two-run homer (his fourteenth) and two runs.  Brian Harper was 2-for-4 with a two-run homer, his seventh.  Dan Gladden was 2-for-4 with a double.  Chuck Knoblauch was 2-for-4.  Shane Mack was 1-for-4 with a home run, his sixteenth.

Pitching star:  Kevin Tapani pitched eight innings, giving up two runs on six hits and a walk and striking out three.

Opposition star:  Carlos Martinez was 3-for-3.

The game:  The Indians got a man to third in the third, but the scoring did not start until the fourth, when Mack hit a home run to give the Twins a 1-0 lead.  In the sixth, Puckett singled and Harper hit a two-run homer to make it 3-0.

Cleveland had just two singles in the first five innings, but they got on the board in the sixth.  Felix Fermin led off with a single, Jerry Browne had a one-out single, a ground out put men on second and third, and Albert Belle had a two-run single to cut the margin to 3-2.  They got the tying run to second with two out in the seventh, but did not score.  The Twins got the two runs back in the eighth when Knoblauch singled and Puckett hit a two-run homer, making the score 5-2.

The Indians threatened in the ninth.  Mike Aldrete walked, went to second on a ground out, and scored on a Luis Lopez single to reduce the Twins lead to 5-3.  The tying run was up to bat with one out, but Chris James and Glenallen Hill each struck out to end the game.

WP:  Tapani (12-7).  LP:  Dave Otto (1-4).  S:  Rick Aguilera (34).

Notes:  Gene Larkin was at first base in place of Kent Hrbek.  For a change, the Twins did not use their bench at all, making no substitutions in the lineup.

Puckett raised his average to .329.  Harper raised his average to .313.  Mack was batting .304.  Tapani lowered his ERA to 2.94.  Aguilera gave up a run in one inning to make his ERA 2.45.

Otto started for Cleveland.  He pitched eight innings, but allowed five runs on ten hits and no walks.  He struck out five and threw just 97 pitches.  I guess one would say this was the best year of his career--he went 2-8, 4.23, 1.35 WHIP.  He did have a lower ERA (3.80) in relief in 1994, the last year of his career, but he had a FIP of 4.98 and a WHIP of 1.58.  For his career he was 10-22, 5.06, 1.57 WHIP in 318.1 innings (109 games, 41 starts) spread over eight seasons.  He's another one of those guys who got chance after chance even though he never really did anything to justify it.

Hrbek may have had a minor injury or illness.  He did not play in this game and was used as a pinch-hitter in the next one.  He would be back in the lineup after that.

The White Sox lost Kansas City 7-0 and Oakland lost to Boston 3-0, so the Twins were building a commanding lead in the division.

Record:  The Twins were 76-51, in first place in the American League West, eight games ahead of Chicago and Oakland.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–February 11

Jimmy Ryan (1863)
Kenjiro Tamiya (1928)
George Alusik (1935)
Downtown Ollie Brown (1944)
Ben Oglivie (1949)
Tom Veryzer (1953)
Todd Benzinger (1963)
Scott Pose (1967)
J. R. Towles (1984)

Kenjiro Tamiya is a member of the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame, playing from 1949-1963.  He began as a pitcher, and came within one out of pitching the first perfect game in Nippon Pro Baseball history.  A shoulder injury required him to switch to the outfield in 1952.  He was a seven-time all-star.

We would also like to wish a very happy birthday to Moss.

Continue reading Happy Birthday–February 11 →

Keeping Track

1991 Rewind: Game One Hundred Twenty-six

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BALTIMORE 7, MINNESOTA 3 IN BALTIMORE

Date:  Sunday, August 25.

Batting stars:  Mike Pagliarulo was 2-for-4 with a double.  Greg Gagne was 2-for-4 with a stolen base, his tenth.

Pitching stars:  Terry Leach pitched 2.1 innings, giving up one run on two hits and striking out one.  Mark Guthrie pitched a scoreless inning, giving up a hit and two walks and striking out one.

Opposition stars:  Mike Mussina pitched eight innings, giving up three runs (two earned) on seven hits and four walks and striking out four.  Chito Martinez was 2-for-3 with a double, a walk, and two RBIs.  Leo Gomez was 2-for-4 with a double and two RBIs.  Joe Orsulak was 2-for-4 with a double.

The game:  It was scoreless through three, and Scott Erickson had given up just one hit, a single.  It fell apart in the fourth, though.  Orsulak led off with a single.  With one out, Glenn Davis singled and Randy Milligan walked, loading the bases.  Martinez singled in a run, Gomez doubled home two, and a sacrifice fly made it 4-0 Orioles.

The Twins came back with two in the fifth.  Pagliarulo led off with a double and scored on a pair of ground outs.  Dan Gladden then singled, stole second, and scored on a Gagne single to cut the lead to 4-2.  In the bottom of the fifth, however, Baltimore added three more.  Orsulak had a one-out double and Cal Ripken was intentionally walked.  A wild pitch advanced the runners.  With two out, Milligan hit a two-run double and Martinez followed with another double, making the score 7-2.

The Twins got one back in the fifth.  Kent Hrbek led off with a single, a ground out advanced him to second, and an error brought him home to cut the margin to 7-3.  That was as close as it got, though.  The Twins did not even get another threat going until the ninth.  Pagliarulo and Chuck Knoblauch led off with singles, but a double play followed.  Randy Bush walked, but Gene Larkin lined out to end the game.

WP:  Mussina (2-3).  LP:  Erickson (16-6).  S:  Todd Frohwirth (2).

Notes:  With Erickson pitching, Junior Ortiz caught in place of Brian Harper.  Al Newman was at second base in place of Knoblauch.

The Twins again made liberal use of the bench, using three pinch-hitters in the ninth inning.  Knoblauch batted for Ortiz, Bush batted for Gladden, and Larkin batted for Gagne.  Oddly, Newman and his .207 batting average (and .504 OPS) were not pinch-hit for.

Kirby Puckett was 0-for-4 to drop his average to .328.  Shane Mack was 0-for-4 and fell to .305.

Erickson continued to struggle.  He pitched well for three innings, but his line was 4.1 innings, six runs, six hits, two walks, and three strikeouts.  His ERA went up to 3.22.  Leach's ERA went to 2.78.

Frohwirth had an awesome year in 1991.  He started the year in AAA, not coming to the majors until late May, but once he got there he went 7-3, 1.87, 0.97 WHIP with three saves.  He had another good year in 1992 and was still fairly good in 1993, then he fell off a cliff.  In 1994, pitching for Boston, he went 0-3, 10.80, 2.14 WHIP.  He made only four more major league appearances, for California in 1996.  I suspect an injury was involved, but I don't remember and don't have time to check.

The White Sox lost to Cleveland 3-0 and Oakland lost to Milwaukee 8-2, so the Twins' lead remained the same.

Record:  The Twins were 75-51, in first place in the American League West, six games ahead of Chicago and Oakland.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–February 10

Horace Wilson (1845)
Jim Keenan (1858)
Curt Welch (1862)
Billy Evans (1884)
Herb Pennock (1894)
Bill Adair (1913)
Allie Reynolds (1917)
George Sobek (1920)
Randy Jackson (1926)
Billy O'Dell (1933)
Dick Bogard (1937)
Jim Barr (1948)
Larry McWilliams (1954)
Lenny Dykstra (1963)
Lenny Webster (1965)
Jayhawk Owens (1969)
Alberto Castillo (1970)
Bobby Jones (1970)
Kevin Sefcik (1971)
Lance Berkman (1976)
Cesar Izturis (1980)
Alex Gordon (1984)
Duke Welker (1986)
Jeanmar Gomez (1988)
Liam Hendriks (1989)
Max Kepler (1993)

Horace Wilson was an American professor English at Tokyo University.  He is credited with introducing baseball to Japan in either 1872 or 1873.

Billy Evans was the youngest umpire in major league history, starting his career at age 22.  He was an American League umpire from 1906-1027.  He would later become general manager of the Cleveland Indians and the Detroit Tigers, and was president of the Southern Association from 1942-1946.

Bill Adair was a long-time minor league player (1935-1956) and manager (1949-1973).  He also was the scout credited with signing Andre Dawson and Tim Raines.

George Sobek was a long-time scout for the White Sox, credited with signing Denny McLain, Steve Trout, and Mike Squires.  He also played in the NBA and was a long-time college basketball referee.

Another long-time scout, Dick Bogard played in the minors for six years, managed for three, and was a scout for nearly thirty years, mostly for Houston and Oakland.  He is credited with signing Walt Weiss, Jason Giambi, and Ben Grieve.

Jim Barr was drafted six different times before finally signing.  Minnesota drafted him in the sixth round of the January Secondary draft in 1970, but he did not sign.

Continue reading Happy Birthday–February 10 →

Earth Day Every Day

Food

30 Comments

Thanks so much to DG for suggesting this as our next topic! The good news is that it's super simple and not complex in any respect.

Oh, wait.

After spending the last week avoiding writing this post and finally deciding that the best approach would be to start by deriding DG, I finally did a little research*. Not too much, though, because one of my big frustrations with trying to make environmentally-friendly choices is that if you research long enough, the less clear everything becomes.

So here are some of the key tips and resources I found that all seem to make sense.

How You Shop
Remember last month's topic? It's back! That's because bringing reusable bags to the grocery store is a great idea. At first, this was hard to remember, but once it's a habit, it becomes automatic.

Produce
Recommendations include to eat local, organic, and in season. Sounds easy enough, but what's local and in season in Minnesota in early February? Our family shops primarily at a co-op, and a certain amount of the produce is local, even in the winter. But with kids in the house, buying things they'll probably actually eat is just as much as a consideration as what's local.

How do you balance a desire to eat flavors from around the globe with the desire to eat foods grown close to home?

Meat and Dairy
Eating local and buying organic both come up in this category as well. But along with that, eating less is also recommended. I'm vegetarian and the family eats vegetarian at home, though the boys choose to eat meat pretty regularly at school lunch. When the boys were a little younger, I worried that they just wouldn't like most of the vegetarian dinners we made, but it turns out that if you expose them to things enough times (just like the advice books all recommend), kids really do start to eat more things! That's not to say they don't have their moments, and the peperoncino still ends up having a quesadilla once or twice a week when he won't eat what the rest of us are having for dinner.

Seafood
Our oceans are in trouble, as are many fish populations. The good news is that if you eat fish, there are a couple of great resources to help you make more environmentally friendly choices. There's the Marine Stewardship Council and the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Seafood Watch.

Leftovers
Eat them!

Okay, yes, there's a bit more to it than that. And one of my ongoing frustrations in my household is seeing how much food is uneaten any given week. I try to at least talk to the boys off and on about the concept of wasting something and what we can do to not waste so much (this applies to much more than just food).

As I mentioned last month, we do have a great composting program in our community, so at the very least I can take a little comfort in knowing that what's not eaten isn't going into a landfill.

Things I'd Like to Change in My Own Home

  • Consider cutting back on dairy. We do eat some vegan meals already (which are in the repertoire because we like them, not specifically because they're vegan), but I like the idea of being on the lookout for some additional recipes to try. I had to give up dairy for a time when the peperoncino was young (because it was linked to his reflux), and I found that the best vegan dishes are really well seasoned so that they still have a lot of flavor.
  • Get some cloth napkins for everyday use. We don't use napkins at all of our meals, but some of the time they're essential, and I'd like to stop just giving everyone paper towels when that happens.
  • For cleaning up spills, use cleaning rags more often instead of paper towels. I cut up a pair of very old flannel pajamas recently, and I've been working on reaching for one of those rags rather than automatically grabbing a paper towel. Of course not having any toddlers in the house also helps when it comes to cutting down on spills...

So what about you? What are you doing well when it comes to food and would you like to do differently?

*Here's the main article I used for reference when writing this post if you'd like to peruse the full list of tips.