Harry Rice (1901)
Dick Bartell (1907)
Lew Burdette (1926)
Wade Blasingame (1943)
Rich Chiles (1946)
Greg Luzinski (1950)
Lyman Bostock (1950)
Wayne Tolleson (1955)
Lee Guetterman (1958)
Mike Benjamin (1965)
Jay Payton (1972)
Ricky Ledee (1973)
Joe Nathan (1974)
Jonny Gomes (1980)
Yusmeiro Petit (1984)
Adam Ottovino (1985)
Drew Pomeranz (1988)
Griffin Jax (1994)
Mike Benjamin was drafted by Minnesota in the seventh round in January, 1985, but did not sign.
Well, here’s your last quiet Sunday before we hit Thanksgiving week and get plunged down the chute to 2022.
Youssef’s grandfather was a muezzin in his native Tunisia, and that influence is a strong draw for me. For a couple of months, once upon a time, I would end my twelve hour night watches with one last Sumer, savored as the muezzin announced the adhan for Fajr about 75 meters away. Those were some of the most peaceful moments I’ve known.
Youssef’s vocals are incredible — the finesse of his phrasing, the extreme upper falsetto and how cleanly he accesses it, the warmth of his lower range.
Here he’s joined by a knockout trio of future legends — Matt Brewer on bass, Ferenc Nemeth on the kit, & Aaron Parks on the keys.
(3 votes, average: 9.00 out of 10)
Loading... MINNESOTA 2, WASHINGTON 1 IN WASHINGTON
Date: Friday, June 5.
Batting stars: Frank Quilici was 2-for-3. Tony Oliva was 2-for-4.
Pitching stars: Bert Blyleven struck out seven in seven innings, giving up one run on five hits and a walk. Ron Perranoski pitched two perfect innings.
Opposition stars: Lee Maye was 2-for-3 with a home run, his fourth. Casey Cox pitched seven innings, giving up two runs on seven hits and three walks and striking out three. Darold Knowles pitched two shutout innings, giving up one hit.
The game: Cesar Tovar led off the game with a walk, stole second, and scored on an Oliva single to put the Twins up 1-0. Maye led off the bottom of the first with a home run, tying it 1-1.
The Twins put men on second and third with two out in the fourth, but it stayed 1-1 until the fifth. Quilici led off with a single, was bunted to second, and scored on a Tovar single to put the Twins up 2-1.
And that was it. The Senators only twice got a man to second and never got a man to third, as the Twins held the 2-1 victory.
WP: Blyleven (1-0).
LP: Cox (3-4).
S: Perranoski (13).
Notes: Jim Holt was in left field in place of Brant Alyea. Quilici was at second base in place of Rod Carew. Carew would not return until June 9, so he apparently was dealing with some minor injury or illness.
Oliva was batting .325. Harmon Killebrew was 1-for-4 and was batting .317. Blyleven had an ERA of 1.29. Perranoski had an ERA of 1.80.
Quilici was batting .191.
As you have probably figured out by now, this was Blyleven's major league debut. He had been 4-2, 2.50 at AAA Evansville. The story he told so often was true--the first man he faced, Lee Maye, hit a home run off him. And in fact, he did strike out Frank Howard in the sixth.
We're in early June, and neither Tovar, Killebrew, nor Oliva has been given a game off yet. I know this is the old days when men were men, but I suspect Bill Rigney was somewhat of an old-school manager even for his time.
The Senators played two ex-Twins: second baseman Bernie Allen, who was 1-for-3, and John Roseboro, who pinch-hit and was 0-for-1.
Casey Cox was a pretty fair pitcher for several years: 39-42, 3.70, 1.32. I suspect his won-lost record is affected by the fact that he spent his entire career with bad teams: the Senators/Rangers and the early-seventies Yankees. He appeared in 308 games, starting 59 of them. Slightly more than half of his starts--30--came in 1970.
Record: The Twins were 32-15, in first place in the American League West, two games ahead of California.
Bobby Mathews (1851)
Charlie Bennett (1854)
Billy Clingman (1869)
Andy High (1897)
Freddie Lindstrom (1905)
Paul Richards (1908)
Stan Musial (1920)
Warren Hacker (1924)
Tom McCraw (1940)
Bill Almon (1952)
Rick Peters (1955)
Mike Mason (1958)
Mark Eichhorn (1960)
Dick Schofield (1962)
Ken Griffey (1969)
Todd Erdos (1973)
Brian Meadows (1975)
Hank Blalock (1980)
Ryan LeMarre (1988)
Rick Peters was drafted by Minnesota in the eighteenth round in 1973, but did not sign.
I fell asleep putting the kids to sleep. That’s supposed to be Daddy Time!
(3 votes, average: 8.67 out of 10)Loading... BOSTON 5, MINNESOTA 1 IN BOSTON
Date: Thursday, June 4.
Batting star: Rod Carew was 2-for-4.
Pitching star: Steve Barber pitched two shutout innings, giving up two walks.
Opposition stars: Carl Yastrzemski was 3-for-3 with a walk. Mike Andrews was 2-for-3 with a two-run homer (his fifth), two walks, and two runs. Reggie Smith was 2-for-4. Billy Conigliaro was 1-for-5 with a home run (his fourth) and two runs. Sonny Siebert pitched a complete game, giving up one run on five hits and one walk and striking out four.
The game: The Twins had two on in the first and the Red Sox had two in both the first and second, but it was scoreless until the third, when singles by Andrews, Yastrzemski, and Rico Petrocelli gave Boston a 1-0 lead. The Twins tied it 1-1 in the fifth when Paul Ratliff singled, was bunted to second, and scored on a Carew single.
But that was as good as it got for the Twins. The Red Sox got the lead back in the bottom of the fifth when Andrews walked and Yastrzemski and Smith singled. They took control in the sixth. Tom Satriano was hit by a pitch, and with one out Andrews and Conigliaro hit back-to-back homers, giving Boston a 5-1 lead. The Twins did not get a baserunner in the final three innings.
WP: Siebert (5-2).
LP: Jim Kaat (5-2).
S: None.
Notes: Rick Renick was in left field in place of Brant Alyea. Ratliff was once again behind the plate in place of George Mitterwald. Alyea pinch-hit for Bill Zepp in the seventh.
Carew was batting .393. Renick was 1-for-4 and was batting .324. Tony Oliva was 0-for-4 and was batting .321. Harmon Killebrew was 0-for-3 and was batting .318.
Kaat pitched 5.1 innings, giving up four runs on eight hits and four walks and striking out four.
Presumably a game on Wednesday, June 3 was rained out.
Killebrew drew a walk in his sixth consecutive game. He had ten walks in those games. For his career, he led the league in walks four times, drew over a hundred walks seven times, and drew ninety or more walks ten times.
Record: The Twins were 31-15, in first place in the American League West, two games ahead of California. They had the best winning percentage in the league at .674, bested only by the Big Red Machine in the National League (.712).
Joe Sommer (1958)
Kenesaw Landis (1866)
Clark Griffith (1869)
George McBride (1880)
Leon Cadore (1890)
Larry Benton (1897)
Jay Ritchie (1936)
Herm Starrette (1938)
Jay Johnstone (1945)
Rick Monday (1945)
Ron Cash (1949)
Alex Arias (1967)
Gabe White (1971)
J. D. Drew (1975)
Sam Fuld (1981)
Brock Peterson (1983)
Greg Holland (1985)
Cody Allen (1988)
Kenesaw Landis, as I'm sure you know, was the first commissioner of baseball, holding the job from 1920 until his death in 1944.
Pitcher Clark Griffith was a star for the Cubs before jumping to the White Sox when the American League was formed. Later, of course, he was the owner of the Twins franchise while it was still in Washington. His adopted son, Calvin, brought the team to Minnesota.
Ron Cash was drafted by Minnesota in the sixth round in 1969, but did not sign.
I’ve been introducing the Poissonnière to the greats. This is one of her favorite videos.
(3 votes, average: 9.33 out of 10)Loading... 
