Monthly Archives: May 2020

Keeping Track

Random Rewind: 1994, Game Thirty

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MINNESOTA 9, TEXAS 7 IN TEXAS

Date:  Saturday, May 7.

Batting stars:  David McCarty was 3-for-5 with a triple and a double.  Scott Leius was 2-for-3 with a double, two walks, a stolen base, and three runs.  Shane Mack was 2-for-4 with a home run, a double, a walk, two runs, and two RBIs.  Chuck Knoblauch was 2-for-5 with two doubles, a walk, and two runs.

Pitching star:  Pat Mahomes pitched six innings, giving up two runs on five hits and three walks and striking out four.

Opposition stars:  Bill Ripken was 4-for-5 with two doubles.  Will Clark was 2-for-4 with a home run (his fourth), a walk, and two runs.  Doug Strange was 2-for-4.  Manny Lee was 2-for-5 with a double and two RBIs.  Juan Gonzalez was 2-for-5.

The game:  Doubles by Knoblauch and Mack put the Twins ahead 1-0 in the first inning.  In the second Leius doubled, went to third on a McCarty single, and scored on a sacrifice fly to make it 2-0.

The Rangers got on the board in the second when Clark walked, Gonzalez singled, a bunt moved them to second and third, and a ground out scored Clark.  Clark homered leading off the fourth to tie it, but Mack homered leading off the fifth to make it 3-2 Twins.  It went to 4-2 in the sixth when Leius walked, went to second on an error, and scored on McCarty's double.

The Twins appeared to take control in the seventh.  Alex Cole singled and Mack walked.  RBI singles by Pedro Munoz, Leius, and Matt Walbeck put the Twins up 7-2.  Texas scored in the bottom of the seventh on doubles by Ripken and Lee, but the Twins got the run back in the eighth when Knoblauch doubled, went to third on a bunt, and scored on a sacrifice fly.  The Rangers scored in the bottom of the eighth on singles by Gonzalez, Ripken, and Lee, but the Twins again got the run back in the ninth when Leius walked, stole second, and scored on an error.

The Twins had a comfortable 9-4 lead going to the bottom of the ninth.  Rick Aguilera came in, presumably just to get an inning of work.  it was work, all right.  Chris James opened the inning with a single-plus error and scored on a Jose Canseco single.  The next two batters were retired, but singles by Doug Strange, Junior Ortiz, and Ripken made the score 7-5 and brought the deciding run to the plate in Lee.  He grounded out to Aguilera, and the victory was finally preserved.

WP:  Mahomes (2-1).  LP:  Kenny Rogers (2-3).  S:  None.

Notes:  McCarty was at first base in place of Kent Hrbek, who was out due to injury.  Munoz was in right, with Kirby Puckett at DH and Dave Winfield out of the lineup.

Mack had missed the first month of the season, so this was only his fourth game.  He started with a bang, as he was batting .538 after this game.  He would finish at .333.  Cole was batting .340.  He would finish at .296.  Puckett was batting .331.  He would finish at .317.

Twins pitchers were not off to a particularly good start, or at least the ones used in this game were not.  After the game, Mahomes had an ERA of 6.12.  He would finish at 4.73.  Mark Guthrie was at 10.00.  He would finish at 6.14.  Carl Willis was at 7.40.  He would finish at 5.92.  Aguilera was at 6.94.  He would finish at 3.63.

Texas starter (and future Twin) Kenny Rogers pitched 6.1 innings, allowing six runs (five earned) on eight hits and four walks and striking out seven.

The Rangers had some thump in the middle of their lineup:  Canseco, Clark, and Gonzalez.  They also had Ivan Rodriguez, who wasn't exactly a banjo hitter.  Despite that, they were sixth in the league in home runs.  Clark hit just 13 homers that year, and Canseco just 19.  Canseco was the only one to hit more than twenty homers that season--he had thirty-one.

It should also be pointed out that this was a strike season.  The season ended on August 10, and there was no post-season.

This was the first game of a stretch in which the Twins won four in a row and eleven of twelve.

Record:  The Twins were 12-18, in fifth (last) place in the American League Central, five games behind Chicago.  They would finish 53-60, in fourth place, fourteen games behind Chicago.

The Rangers were 12-15, in first place (!) in the American League West, 1.5 games ahead of Seattle.  They would finish 52-62, in first place (!) in the American League West, one game ahead of Oakland.

Twins Top Moments

Joe Mauer Region: #6 vs. #11

7 Comments

#6. Scott Baker's Near Perfecto

Baker was always one of my favorite pitchers.  Maybe it was that he looked terrified every time he was out on the mound.  Maybe it was because the Twins announcers (especially Bert) relentlessly criticized him for no reason.  But man I was pulling for him so hard every start and this was a dream come true.

He entered the 9th inning with his perfect game.  He didn't make it, but a 1-hit shutout is still nice.

#11. Twins Homer 11 Times on April 20th, 2019

Man, playing the Orioles was fun last year.

  1. 2nd inning Game 1: Eddie Rosario solo HR (415 feet)
  2. 2nd inning Game 1: Willians Astudillo solo HR (372 feet)
  3. 5th inning Game 1: Eddie Rosario solo HR (367 feet)
  4. 1st inning Game 2: Nelson Cruz 2-run HR (410 feet)
  5. 1st inning Game 2: C.J. Cron solo HR (381 feet)
  6. 3rd inning Game 2: Eddie Rosario 2-run HR (398 feet)
  7. 3rd inning Game 2: Mitch Garver 3-run HR (378 feet)
  8. 4th inning Game 2: Jonathan Schoop 3-run HR (389 feet)
  9. 8th inning Game 2: Mitch Garver solo HR (394 feet)
  10. 8th inning Game 2: Nelson Cruz solo HR (415 feet)
  11. 9th inning Game 2: Jonathan Schoop solo HR (435 feet)

The Better Moment

  • Scott Baker's Near Perfecto (61%, 11 Votes)
  • Twins Homer 11 Times in One Day (2019) (39%, 7 Votes)

Total Voters: 18

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The Better Moment

  • Tim Laudner Picks Off Darrell Evans, ALCS Game 4 (50%, 9 Votes)
  • Willians Astudillo Chugs, Lets His Hair Fly (50%, 9 Votes)

Total Voters: 18

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The Better Moment

  • Baylor Homers (81%, 13 Votes)
  • 5-4-2 Double Play (19%, 3 Votes)

Total Voters: 16

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Keeping Track

Random Rewind: 1990, Game One Hundred Fifty-two

TEXAS 2, MINNESOTA 1 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Friday, September 21.

Batting star:  Pedro Munoz was 1-for-3.

Pitching stars:  Kevin Tapani pitched five innings, giving up one run on four hits and no walks and striking out two.  Juan Berenguer pitched four innings, giving up one run on four hits and no walks and striking out three.

Opposition stars:  Bobby Witt pitched a complete game, giving up one run on two hits and four walks and striking out eight.  Jack Daugherty was 3-for-4 with two RBIs.  Rafael Palmeiro was 2-for-4.  Ruben Sierra was 2-for-4.

The game:  The Twins took a 1-0 lead in the second.  Brian Harper and Paul Sorrento drew two-out walks and Munoz had an RBI single.  The Twins left the bases loaded, however, and it would cost them, as they never got a man into scoring position again.

In the fourth, singles by Julio Franco, Palmeiro, and Daugherty tied the score 1-1.  In the sixth, singles by Palmeiro, Sierra, and Daugherty put the Rangers ahead 2-1.

The Twins only had two hits in the game, Munoz' RBI single and a sixth-inning single by Kent Hrbek.

WP:  Witt (17-9).  LP:  Berenguer (8-5).  S:  None.

Notes:  Al Newman was at shortstop in place of Greg Gagne.  Newman's primary position in 1990 was second base, but Nelson Liriano played second in this game.  Second base was pretty much a blank space in 1990, with Newman, Liriano, and Fred Manrique trying their best but failing to fill the position.  In 1991, of course, Chuck Knoblauch would solve this problem.

Munoz was in right field.  Shane Mack, who played all over the outfield in 1990, was in center, and Kirby Puckett, who of course was normally in center, played left.  The Twins really didn't have a regular right fielder in 1990.  Johnny Moses played the most games there, with fifty-two.  Mack had fifty-one, Gene Larkin forty-seven, Randy Bush thirty-one, Carmelo Castillo twenty, and Munoz nineteen.  Puckett played nine games there, and Jim Dwyer was out there for one.

Sorrento was the DH in this game.  That's another position at which the Twins did not have a regular.  Larkin was there for forty-three games, Castillo thirty-five, Bush twenty-seven, Sorrenty twenty-three, Dwyer twenty-two, Hrbek twenty, Harper eleven, and Moses ten, with eight other players serving in the role for single digits.

Bush pinch-hit for Mack in the eighth.  He remained in the game in right field, with Munoz moving to left and Puckett coming out of the game.

Mack was leading the team in batting at .318.  He would finish at .326.  No one else was over .300, although Puckett and Harper were in the .290s.

On the other end of the scale, Sorrento was batting .190.  He would finish at .207 in 135 plate appearances.

I don't know why Tapani only pitched five innings and threw just seventy-six pitches.  He was coming off three poor outings in a row, so possibly Tom Kelly decided to take the five good innings and not push any farther.  I also don't know why Berenguer pitched four innings.  The bullpen was not overtaxed, and there'd have been September call-ups anyway.  It was not as uncommon for relievers to go multiple innings back then, so maybe Kelly just saw no reason to take him out as long as he was pitching well.  The fact that this was a meaningless game in a lost season may have had to do with both decisions, also.

This was Bobby Witt's best season:  17-10, 3.36.  For his career he was not all that good--142-157, 4.83, 1.57 WHIP--but he was good in 1990.  I remembered him as a Twins killer, and I was right.  For his career he was 17-7, 3.63 against our boys.

Record:  The Twins were 68-84, in seventh (last) place in the American League West, twenty-nine games behind Oakland.  The would finish 74-88, in seventh place, twenty-nine games behind Oakland.

The Rangers were 80-70, in third place in the American League West, sixteen games behind Oakland.  They would finish 83-79, in third place, twenty games behind Oakland.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–May 6

Bonesetter Reese (1855)
Walton Cruise (1890)
Mike McCormick (1917)
Willie Mays (1931)
Russ Gibson (1939)
Bill Hands (1940)
Masanori Murakami (1944)
Steve Staggs (1951)
Larry Andersen (1953)
Al Williams (1954)
Gerardo Parra (1987)
Jose Altuve (1990)

John “Bonesetter” Reese worked with many baseball players and other famous people in the first part of the twentieth century.  Today we might call him a physical therapist, although he did not have a formal degree.  “Bonesetting” is a Welsh term for the treatment of muscle and tendon strains.

Masanori Murakami was the first Japanese-born player in the major leagues.

Infielder Steve Staggs was drafted by Minnesota in the fourteenth round in 1970, but did not sign.

Continue reading Happy Birthday–May 6 →

Twins Top Moments

Kirby Puckett Division: #6 vs #11

7 Comments

#6.  Darrell Evans Picked Off Third by Tim Laudner

Up 2-1 in the series and up 4-2 in the 6th inning, the Tigers got to Viola. Dave Bergman had just singled in a run off Keith Atherton and the Tigers had runners on 2nd and 3rd with one out.  Not sure why Evans was so far off third base, but Buck Ninety took advantage.

https://youtu.be/laIQMVJcrDM?t=4840

#11.  Willians Astudillo Scores From First

Oh, La Tortuga.  An inspiration to us all.

The Better Moment

  • Tim Laudner Picks Off Darrell Evans, ALCS Game 4 (50%, 9 Votes)
  • Willians Astudillo Chugs, Lets His Hair Fly (50%, 9 Votes)

Total Voters: 18

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