Tag Archives: Groundskeeper Willis

Keeping Track

1991 Rewind: Game Thirty-four

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MILWAUKEE 6, MINNESOTA 3 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Thursday, May 16.

Batting stars:  Greg Gagne was 2-for-4 with a home run, his fourth.  Mike Pagliarulo was 2-for-4 with a double.  Pedro Munoz was 1-for-3 with a home run and a walk.

Pitching stars:  Carl Willis pitched 3.1 innings of relief, giving up one run on five hits.  Terry Leach pitched 1.2 scoreless innings, giving up one hit.  Rick Aguilera pitched a scoreless inning, giving up one hit and two walks and striking out one.

Opposition stars:  Greg Vaughn was 3-for-5 with a triple.  Dale Sveum was 2-for-3 with a double and a walk.  Willie Randolph was 2-for-4 with a walk.  Robin Yount was 2-for-5 with a home run (his eighth), two runs, and two RBIs.  Bill Wegman pitched five innings, giving up two runs on five hits and a walk and striking out two.  Darren Holmes pitched four innings, giving up one run on four hits and no walks and striking out one.

The game:  Most of the runs came early.  Paul Molitor led off the game by being hit by a pitch.  He stole second and scored on a single by Vaughn, who was thrown out trying to stretch the hit to a double.  Yount then followed with a home run to give the Brewers a 2-0 lead.

The Twins got the runs back in the bottom of the first.  Gagne led off the inning with a home run.  Shane Mack was hit by a pitch, went to second on a Kirby Puckett single, and scored on a pair of fly outs to tie the score 2-2.

Milwaukee then took control.  Dante Bichette led off the second with a home run.  In the third, Vaughn hit a two-out triple, Yount singled him home, and Franklin Stubbs hit an RBI double to give the Brewers a 5-2 advantage.

The Twins didn't do a lot after that.  Pagliarulo hit a one-out double in the fourth but didn't advance.  A couple of singles didn't amount to anything.  Milwaukee added a run in the seventh when Sveum doubled and Randolph singled, making it 6-2.  Munoz hit a home run leading off the ninth, but the Twins never threatened to get back into the game.

WP:  Wegman (1-1).  LP:  Allan Anderson (1-3).  S:  Holmes (1).

Notes:  With the day game, Dan Gladden was out of the lineup.  Shane Mack was in left and Munoz in right.  Gene Larkin was at first base replacing Kent Hrbek.  Al Newman was at second, replacing Chuck Knoblauch.

Brian Harper was 1-for-3 and was batting .391.  Gagne raised his average to .301.  Chili Davis was 0-for-4 and was batting .301.  Leach lowered his ERA to 2.77.  Aguilera's ERA was at 1.84.

Anderson lasted just three innings, giving up five runs on six hits and a walk and striking out two.  In his last two starts, he had given up nine runs on twelve hits in seven innings.  His ERA went from 3.55 to 4.80.

Willis had appeared in four games since his call-up on April 23.  Three of those appearances were of three innings or longer.

Holmes had three saves in 1991.  All of them were of the three-or-more-innings variety.  He would go on to get 59 saves in his career.  He was the closer for Colorado in their first year of existence in 1993 and was again their closer for about a month in 1995.

Bill Wegman was in the Brewers' rotation from 1986-1988, then missed a lot of time in the next two seasons due to injuries.  He came back in 1991 to have the best year of his career, going 15-7, 2.84, 1.12 WHIP.  He had a fine year in 1992 as well, going 13-14 but with an ERA of 3.20 and a WHIP of 1.17.  He pitched 261.1 innings, though, and it was apparently too much for him.  He stayed with Milwaukee for three more seasons, and in fact spent his entire career with them, but he never had a good year again.  For his career he was 81-90, 4.16, 1.29 WHIP.  For two seasons, though, he was an excellent starting pitcher.

Record:  The Twins were 17-17, tied with Chicago for fifth place in the American League West, 3.5 games behind Oakland.  The Twins were just a half game out of fourth and a game out of third.

Keeping Track

1991 Rewind: Game Fourteen

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OAKLAND 7, MINNESOTA 5 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Tuesday, April 23.

Batting stars:  Brian Harper was 3-for-4 with two RBIs.  Greg Gagne was 2-for-4 with a home run (his second) and two runs.  Dan Gladden was 1-for-5 with a two-run homer.

Pitching star:  Terry Leach pitched two shutout innings, giving up a hit and a walk.

Opposition stars:  Jose Canseco was 2-for-3 with two walks, two stolen bases, (his third and fourth), and two runs.  Dave Henderson was 2-for-5 with two doubles.  Willie Wilson was 2-for-5 with a triple.  Lance Blankenship was 2-for-5.  Terry Steinbach was 1-for-4 with a three-run homer, a hit-by-pitch, and two runs.  Kirk Dressendorfer pitched 5.1 innings, giving up two runs on six hits and three walks and striking out two.  Steve Chitren pitched two shutout innings, giving up a hit and striking out one.

The game:  The Athletics jumped on Twins starter Mark Guthrie for three runs in the first inning.  With one out, Henderson doubled, Canseco walked, and Steinbach hit a three-run homer to put Oakland ahead 3-0.  The Twins had a good chance in the second.  Chili Davis drew a one-out walk and Harper singled.  Mike Pagliarulo delivered a single, but Davis was thrown out at the plate.  Randy Bush was caught looking and the inning was over.

The Athletics added to their lead in the third.  Canseco singled, stole second, and went to third on a wild pitch.  Mark McGwire walked, and with two out McGwire and Canseco pulled off a double steal of second and home.  The baserunning gave Oakland a 4-0 lead.  It went to 6-0 in the fourth, as Fred Manrique singled, Wilson tripled, and Henderson doubled.

The Twins got on the board in the fourth.  With one out, Kent Hrbek and Davis walked and Harper had an RBI single.  The Twins still had men on first and third with one out.  Pagliarulo hit a fly to left on which Harper somehow took second without Davis scoring.  Perhaps, having been thrown out at the plate once, Davis (or third base coach Ron Gardenhire) did not want to risk having it happen again.  At any rate, Bush then grounded out to end the inning with the score 6-1.

The teams exchanged runs, with Harper singling one home in the sixth and the Athletics answering with a Blankenship RBI single in the seventh.  The Twins tried to get back into it in the bottom of the seventh.  Gagne singled and Gladden homered to cut the lead to 7-4.  Gagne led off the ninth with a homer to make it 7-5, but that was as good as it would get for the Twins.

WP:  Dressendorfer (2-1).  LP:  Guthrie (0-2).  S:  Dennis Eckersley (5).

Notes:  Bush again started in right field, with Kirby Puckett in center.  Shane Mack pinch-hit for Bush in the sixth and stayed in the game in center, with Puckett moving to right.  Gene Larkin pinch-hit for Mack in the eighth and stayed in the game in right, with Puckett moving back to center.

Larkin was 0-for-1 and was batting .375.  Harper raised his average to .343.  Puckett was 0-for-5 and was batting .309.  Gagne raised his average to .306.

Gladden raised his average to .109.  Mack was 0-for-1 and was batting .133.  Bush was 0-for-2 and was batting .143.  Hrbek was 1-for-3 with a walk and was batting .152.  Scott Leius was 1-for-2 and was batting .176.

Guthrie lasted just 2.1 innings, allowing four runs on four hits and three walks and striking out one.  His ERA was 18.00.  Carl Willis saved the bullpen by pitched 4.2 innings of relief.  He gave up three runs on seven hits and a walk and struck out two.  His ERA was 5.79.  Terry Leach lowered his ERA to 5.40.

The 4.2 innings of relief were not the most Willis would pitch in 1991.  Twice he pitched five innings of relief.  He also had a 4.1 inning appearance and three appearances of four innings.  We can safely say he was used as a long reliever.  For the season, he pitched 89 innings over 40 games.  He was very good, posting an ERA of 2.63 and a WHIP of 1.07.

The Twins winning streak ended at just two.

This was Steve Chitren's only full season in the majors.  He had gotten a September call-up in 1990.  He started 1991 very well, not giving up a run in his first eleven appearances (11 innings).  He had nowhere to go but down, and he did.  He had only one month other than April in which he posted an ERA below 4.00, and he had an awful August (9.39).  For the season, he had an ERA of 4.33 with a WHIP of 1.51.  He was born in Tokyo, but appears to have been raised in the United States.  There's a Steve Chitren of about the right age who was on the run from the law for numerous theft charges in Las Vegas.  He apparently had done the thefts to provide money for a gambling addiction.  No article mentions that he was a former big league ballplayer, though, and one would expect that to be something they would mention, so it may well be a different Steve Chitren.

Record:  The Twins were 4-10, in seventh (last) place in the American League West, six games behind the White Sox.  They were 2.5 games behind sixth-place Kansas City.