Monthly Archives: November 2021

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–November 28

Heinie Pietz (1870)
Frank O'Rourke (1894)
Jerry Gardner (1920)
Wes Westrum (1922)
Sixto Lezcano (1953)
Dave Righetti (1958)
Walt Weiss (1963)
John Burkett (1964)
Matt Williams (1965)
Pedro Astacio (1969)
Robb Nen (1969)
Jose Parra (1972)
Carlos Villaneuva (1983)
Miguel Diaz (1994)

Jerry Gardner spent most of his life in baseball as a minor-league player and manager and as a scout.

We would like to wish a very happy birthday to Mom Runner.

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Keeping Track

1970 Rewind: Game Fifty-two

MINNESOTA 5, BOSTON 2 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Friday, June 12.

Batting stars:  Leo Cardenas was 4-for-4.  Harmon Killebrew was 1-for-2 with three walks.

Pitching stars:  Jim Perry pitched six innings, giving up one run on five hits and two walks and striking out four.  Ron Perranoski pitched 2.1 scoreless innings, giving up one hit and striking out two.

Opposition stars:  Tom Satriano was 2-for-3 with a home run.  Mike Andrews was 2-for-4.

The game:  In the second Brant Alyea reached on an error, went to second on a Cardenas single, and scored on a Perry single to give the Twins a 1-0 lead.  The Twins loaded the bases in the third on two walks and a single but did not score.  In the fifth Tony Oliva singled and went to second on a wild pitch with two out.  Alyea then delivered an RBI double and scored on a Cardenas single to put the Twins up 3-0.

Satriano homered leading off the sixth to make it 3-1.  A pair of singles gave the Red Sox two on with one out, but they could do no more.  In the seventh, singles by Rico Petrocelli, Satriano, and Mike Fiore plated another run to cut the lead to 3-2.

A strikeout ended the inning, however, and the Twins got the runs back in the eighth.  Jim Holt walked, Cardenas got another single, and George Mitterwald singled home a run.  With two out, Carew hit an RBI double to make the score 5-2.  Boston got a one-out single in the ninth from George Scott but did not get the tying run up to bat.

WP:  Perry (8-5).

LP:  Gary Peters (3-7).

S:  Perranoski (14).

Notes:  Rick Renick was at third base, with Harmon Killebrew moving to first.  Holt pinch-ran for Alyea in the fifth and stayed in the game in left field.  Charlie Manuel pinch-hit for Perry in the sixth.  Rich Reese pinch-hit for Renick in the seventh and stayed in the game at first base, with Killebrew moving to third.  Frank Quilici pinch-ran for Killebrew in the eighth and stayed in the game at third base.

Carew was 1-for-5 and was batting .371.  Oliva was 1-for-4 and was batting .333.  Killebrew was batting .315.  Perry was 1-for-2 and was batting .313.  He also had an ERA of 2.81.  Stan Williams gave up a run in two-thirds of an inning and had an ERA of 2.21.  Perranoski had an ERA of 2.00.

It was fun when teams had deeper benches and could make lots of in-game moves with position players.  I miss that.

This was the start of a six-game homestand for the Twins against Boston and Washington.  They had only eight home games in the month of June.

Record:  The Twins were 35-17, in first place in the American League West, 2.5 games ahead of California.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–November 27

Bullet Joe Bush (1892)
Johnny Schmitz (1920)
Billy Moran (1933)
Jose Tartabull (1938)
Dave Giusti (1939)
Dan Spillner (1951)
Mike Scioscia (1958)
Randy Milligan (1961)
Tim Laker (1969)
Ivan Rodriguez (1971)
Willie Bloomquist (1977)
Jimmy Rollins (1978)

No players with connections to the Minnesota Twins appear to have been born on this day. The closest we come is Billy Moran, who was part of a three-team trade involving Minnesota, Cleveland, and the Los Angeles Angels. Minnesota acquired Frank Kostro and Jerry Kindall and sent Lenny Green and Vic Power to Los Angeles. Billy Moran was sent from the Angels to Cleveland in that trade.

Keeping Track

1970 Rewind: Game Fifty-one

NEW YORK 2, MINNESOTA 1 IN NEW YORK

Date:  Wednesday, June 10.

Batting star:  Tony Oliva was 2-for-4 with a triple.

Pitching stars:  Bert Blyleven pitched seven innings, giving up two runs on seven hits and two walks and striking out three.  Ron Perranoski pitched a scoreless inning, walking one and striking out one.

Opposition stars:  Thurman Munson was 2-for-3 with a double.  Horace Clarke was 2-for-4 with a two-run homer, his fourth.  Mel Stottlemyre pitched a complete game, giving up one run on four hits and a walk and striking out seven.

The game:  Neither team advanced a man past second, and neither team had more than one man on base, until the fourth, when Oliva led off with a triple and scored on a ground out to give the Twins a 1-0 lead.  With two out in the fifth, Stottlemyre singled and Clarke hit a two-run homer, putting the Yankees up 2-1.

And that was it.  The Twins did not get a hit after Oliva's triple and the 2-1 score held up.

WP:  Stottlemyre (6-4).

LP:  Blyleven (1-1).

S:  None.

Notes:  Jim Holt was again in left field in place of Brant Alyea.  Charlie Manuel pinch-hit for Blyleven in the eighth.

Rod Carew was 0-for-3 and was batting .377.  Oliva was batting .335.  Harmon Killebrew was 0-for-4 and was batting .313.  Blyleven had an ERA of 1.93.  Perranoski had an ERA of 2.12.

What a frustrating way to lose a game.  Two out, no one on, the pitcher up.  He gets a hit, but no problem.  Horace Clarke, the player who would become emblematic of the state of the Yankees in the mid-60s to mid-70s, was next up.  And he hits a home run, the last homer he would hit all season and one of twenty-seven for his career.

Getting only one run is frustrating, too, but Stottlemyre was a fine pitcher.  164-139, 2.97, 1.22 WHIP, five all-star appearances, twenty-game winner three times.  A torn rotator cuff brought his career to an end at age thirty-two.  If he'd pitched longer, or pitched in an era where the Yankees were good, he'd have had a shot at the Hall of Fame.

Record:  The Twins were 34-17, in first place in the American League West, two games ahead of California.

Keeping Track

Happy Birthday–November 26

Hugh Duffy (1866)
Fred Tenney (1871)
Bob Johnson (1905)
Lefty Gomez (1908)
Howard Easterling (1911)
Bob Elliott (1916)
Eddie Miller (1916)
Jeff Torborg (1941)
Larry Gura (1947)
Richie Hebner (1947)
Jorge Orta (1950)
Jay Howell (1955)
Bob Walk (1956)
Mike Moore (1959)
Harold Reynolds (1960)
Chuck Finley (1962)
Brian Schneider (1976)
Matt Garza (1983)
Matt Carpenter (1985)

Infielder Howard Easterling was a star in the Negro Leagues in the 1930s and 1940s.

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