Charles Comiskey (1859)
Doggie Miller (1864)
Jack Warner (1872)
Bill Sherdel (1896)
Jim Snyder (1932)
Joey Jay (1935)
Jose Santiago (1940)
Cap Peterson (1942)
Duffy Dyer (1945)
Joe Lis (1946)
Billy Conigliaro (1947)
Tom Kelly (1950)
Joe Cowley (1958)
Randy Johnson (1958)
Jeff Huson (1964)
Scott Brosius (1966)
Chris Singleton (1972)
Oliver Perez (1981)
Jarrod Dyson (1984)
Today would have been Mom and Dad A's seventy-seventh wedding anniversary.
Charles Comiskey (1859)
Doggie Miller (1864)
Jack Warner (1872)
Bill Sherdel (1896)
Jim Snyder (1932)
Joey Jay (1935)
Jose Santiago (1940)
Cap Peterson (1942)
Duffy Dyer (1945)
Joe Lis (1946)
Billy Conigliaro (1947)
Tom Kelly (1950)
Joe Cowley (1958)
Randy Johnson (1958)
Jeff Huson (1964)
Scott Brosius (1966)
Chris Singleton (1972)
Oliver Perez (1981)
Jarrod Dyson (1984)
Today would have been Mom and Dad A's seventy-sixth wedding anniversary.
Charles Comiskey (1859)
Doggie Miller (1864)
Jack Warner (1872)
Bill Sherdel (1896)
Jim Snyder (1932)
Joey Jay (1935)
Jose Santiago (1940)
Cap Peterson (1942)
Duffy Dyer (1945)
Joe Lis (1946)
Billy Conigliaro (1947)
Tom Kelly (1950)
Joe Cowley (1958)
Randy Johnson (1958)
Jeff Huson (1964)
Scott Brosius (1966)
Chris Singleton (1972)
Oliver Perez (1981)
Jarrod Dyson (1984)
Today would have been Mom and Dad A's seventy-fifth wedding anniversary.
Charles Comiskey (1859)
Doggie Miller (1864)
Jack Warner (1872)
Bill Sherdel (1896)
Jim Snyder (1932)
Joey Jay (1935)
Jose Santiago (1940)
Cap Peterson (1942)
Duffy Dyer (1945)
Joe Lis (1946)
Billy Conigliaro (1947)
Tom Kelly (1950)
Joe Cowley (1958)
Randy Johnson (1958)
Jeff Huson (1964)
Scott Brosius (1966)
Chris Singleton (1972)
Oliver Perez (1981)
Jarrod Dyson (1984)
This would have been Mom and Dad A's seventy-fourth wedding anniversary.
Date: Friday, June 27.
Batting stars: Dan Ford was 3-for-4 with a walk and three RBIs. Jerry Terrell was 3-for-4 with two RBIs. Lyman Bostock was 2-for-5 with two doubles and two runs.
Pitching star: Vic Albury pitched 4.1 innings of relief, giving up an unearned run on one hit and no walks and striking out four.
Opposition star: Roy Howell was 2-for-4 with two doubles and two runs.
The game: The Twins took the lead in the first inning. Bostock led off with a double, went to third on a pickoff error, and scored on a sacrifice fly to make it 1-0. The Twins opened the second with two singles, but a strikeout/throwout double play took them out of the inning. In the third, Glenn Borgmann led off with a triple and Bostock followed with a double. Ford delivered a two-out single to put the Twins ahead 3-0.
The Rangers got on the board in the fourth when Cesar Tovar doubled and scored on a Mike Hargrove single. Texas then took the lead in the fifth. Tom Grieve led off with a single and scored from first on Howell's double. Roy Smalley's RBI single tied it, and singles by Jim Sundberg and Mike Cubbage put the Rangers up 4-3.
The lead didn't survive the next half-inning, though. Steve Braun walked, went to second on a ground out, and scored the tying run when Terrell singled. Terrell went to second on the throw home, took third on a ground out, and scored on a wild pitch (Twins Baseball!) to give the Twins a 5-4 advantage.
Texas tied it in the seventh when Howell doubled and scored on an error. It stayed 5-5 until the ninth. With two out, Rod Carew walked, Steve Brye singled, and Eric Soderholm walked, loading the bases. Ford then delivered a two-run single and Terrell had an RBI single to make the score 8-5. The Rangers went down in order in the ninth, and in fact their last nine batters were retired.
WP: Albury (5-4). LP: Jim Umbarger (4-4). S: None.
Notes: Tom Kelly was at first base in place of John Briggs, who was out for a week or so. Briggs had come over in a trade from Milwaukee a couple of weeks earlier. Sadly, we did not hit the game in which Kelly hit his home run--he was 0-for-3. He would go back to the minors about two weeks later.
Terrell was at third base in place of Soderholm. Steve Braun, normally in left field, was the DH in place of Tony Oliva. That moved Bostock from right to left and put Brye in right.
Soderholm pinch-hit for Braun in the seventh. Danny Walton pinch-hit for Kelly in the eighth and stayed in the game at first base. Luis Gomez came in for defense in the ninth, replacing Danny Thompson at short.
Carew was batting .369. He would finish at .359. Terrell was batting .327. He would finish at .286. Braun was batting .303. He would finish at .302. Larry Hisle would bat .314 in 255 at-bats. The Twins batted .271, which was second in the league to Boston's .275.
Ford led the team with just 15 home runs. Carew was right behind at 14 and Oliva was next with 13. Soderholm, Braun, and Hisle each had 11. The Twins hit 121 home runs, which was eighth in the league. Cleveland led with 153. California was last with only 55 home runs.
Bert Blyleven led the staff, going 15-10, 3.00. Jim Hughes was 16-14, 3.82--Twins fans really thought he was going to be something. Having him throw 250 innings with 12 complete games at age 23 might not have been such a bright idea. Dave Goltz, who started this game, went 14-14, 3.67. The fourth starter spot was split between Ray Corbin and Albury, neither of whom got much accomplished. Tom Burgmeier and Bill Campbell handled closing chores, and while they did fine they didn't get much help. The Twins' team ERA was 4.05, tenth in the league. Baltimore led at 3.17. The Twins were ninth in WHIP at 1.40. Baltimore led there, too at 1.23.
As you probably noticed, there are players with connections to the Twins playing for Texas: Cesar Tovar, Mike Cubbage, Roy Smalley, and Bill Hands, who started the game for the Rangers.
The Twins lost the first game of the doubleheader 2-0. This was one of only two wins out of eleven games.
Record: The Twins were 32-37, in fourth place in the American League West, 12.5 games behind Oakland. They would finish 76-83, in fourth place, 20.5 games behind Oakland.
The Rangers were 35-38, in third place in the American League West, 11.5 games behind Oakland. They would finish 79-83, in third place, 19 games behind Oakland.
Random record: The Twins are 59-52 in Random Rewind games.
Date: Wednesday, June 19.
Batting stars: Mike Pagliarulo was 2-for-3 with a hit-by-pitch. Kent Hrbek was 2-for-5 with a double. Chili Davis was 1-for-5 with a three-run homer, his sixteenth.
Pitching star: Jack Morris pitched a complete game, giving up four runs on six hits and three walks and striking out six.
Opposition stars: Jeff Robinson pitched 7.2 innings, giving up three runs on five hits and no walks and striking out five. David Segui was 2-for-3. Leo Gomez was 1-for-2 with a two-run homer (his third), two walks, and two runs.
The game: The Twins again jumped out to an early lead with a two-out first inning rally. Kirby Puckett was hit by a pitch, Hrbek singled, and Davis hit a three-run homer to give the Twins a 3-0 lead. The Twins threatened to blow it open early, as in the second they put men on second and third with one out, but a short fly ball and a strikeout ended the threat. The failure allowed the Orioles to get back into the game, as Joe Orsulak drew a one-out walk in the bottom of the second and Gomez followed with a two-run homer, cutting the lead to 3-2.
Baltimore threatened to tie it in the fifth, as Gomez led off with a walk and Segui singled, but a long fly out and a double play ended the threat. The Orioles did more than threaten in the seventh. With one out Orsulak singled and Gomez walked. Consecutive RBI singles by Segui and Ernie Whitt put Baltimore ahead 4-3. The score remained there through eight innings.
But in the ninth the Twins came back, with plenty of help from the Orioles. They began the inning with singles by Brian Harper, Gene Larkin, and Pagliarulo to tie it 4-4. With one out, a wild pitch moved the runners to second and third, resulting in an intentional walk to Randy Bush. A wild pitch-plus-error scored two runs and yet another wild pitch scored a third run, making the score 7-4. Shane Mack then singled and scored from first on Puckett's single, making it 8-4. Baltimore went down in order in the bottom of the ninth.
WP: Morris (9-5). LP: Olson (0-3). S: None.
Notes: Al Newman replaced Chuck Knoblauch at second base, and his .286 OBP was placed in the leadoff spot. He went 0-for-4. Mack was in left in place of Dan Gladden and batted second. Pedro Munoz started in right.
The Twins made a bunch of changes in the ninth inning. Gene Larkin pinch-hit for Munoz. Knoblauch then pinch-ran for Larkin and went to second base. Gladden pinch-ran for Harper and stayed in the game in left field, with Mack moving to right. Bush pinch-hit for Newman.
Harper was 1-for-4 and was batting .344. Puckett was 1-for-4 and was batting .328.
As I go through Morris' games, I wonder if Tom Kelly was a little intimidated by him. Maybe not, maybe Kelly just had that much confidence in him. But Morris was allowed to stay in games much longer than any other pitcher would have been, even in 1991, and this is one example of that. Morris had pitched well for six innings and the Twins led 3-2. He struck out the first batter he faced, but then he gave up a hit. Then he walked a batter. His pitch count was approaching a hundred. But he stayed in the game. Then he gave up another hit, tying the score and putting men on first and third. Still, he stayed in the game. He gave up another hit, losing the lead. Still, he stayed in the game. He got a double play to end the inning, then cruised through the eighth and ninth. The Twins came back and won, so it worked out, but there's no other pitcher who would've been allowed to stay in the game through the seventh inning.
This was Davis' seventh home run in June. He would go on to hit ten in June, more than a third of his season total and twice as many as he would hit in any other month. His other June numbers were not particularly outstanding--in June he batted .253/.345/.596, his season numbers were .277/.385/.507. I don't know that we can contribute his June homers to anything but coincidence, but it's kind of interesting.
The Twins had now won seventeen of eighteen and twenty of twenty-two.
Record: The Twins were 40-26, in first place in the American League West, 1.5 games ahead of Oakland.
I found this gem shortly after JeffA started his 1987 Rewind. This evening seemed like the appropriate time to share it. I didn't want to detract from Jeff's content, and in any case figured there were enough goodies that this would be worth its own post. Hope you don't mind, Chaps.
I used a random number generator to pick a season from the past with the idea that I would quickly highlight the Twins history that occurred today in that year. The generator sent me to the year 1998.
The Twins concluded a sixth-consecutive losing season in 1998 and began to finally embrace a full rebuild. Relatively cheap veterans Greg Swindell, Bob Tewksbury, Mike Morgan, Otis Nixon, and Orlando Merced were all traded during the season or allowed to leave as free agents. Paul Molitor finally retired.
The STrib's John Millea noted, "Don't be surprised if the 1999 season is Tom Kelly's last as manager of the team. The payroll is getting smaller, the players are getting younger, and Kelly's patience continues to wear thin. He is at his best when the clubhouse is full of veterans who have been through the wars and earned their stripes. Kelly is not exactly the fatherly type when it comes to youngsters, and sometimes that has resulted in strained relationships that can hinder the ballclub's progress."
Well, that wasn't entirely true. 1999 wasn't Kelly's last season with the team, although the payroll did get smaller and the roster got younger. Who knows how Kelly's patience wore. The sentence about striped veterans is the type of non-factual, journalistic mumbo-jumbo that would make Ken Tremendous a cult hero within years.
On this date, Terry Steinbach had filed for free agency and the Twins were mulling whether to bring him back. Their internal candidates were Javier Valentin and A.J. Pierzynski, and the team did not believe either was fully ready for the next season. Still, the team had been disappointed with Steinbach's production behind the plate the previous two years.
Postscript: On January 4, the Twins finally re-signed Steinbach. Despite being nearly ready, it would take Pierzynski two more years to become the starting catcher mainly due to some, um, maturity issues. One wonders at the official number of "wars" Pierzynski has endured in his career.
Did You Know that David Ortiz played in 86 games, and Torii Hunter played in 6 games that season? On the mound, Eric Milton started 32 games that year. Hunter has been retired for one season, and Ortiz just retired. Milton was just 105 days older than Ortiz, and just 122 days older than Hunter, but has not played in a game since June 27, 2009 even though he earned more than $47 million in his career.
Did You Also Know that the winning pitcher in Milton's last game was King Felix?
Furthermore, Did You Know that the final hitter Milton faced was Junior Griffey?
Do your job.
The last time the Twins fired a manager, back in 1986, they waffled and wavered and oscillated between candidates. Jobs were offered and promised and then withdrawn. The whole process was, quite simply, bizarre.
Continue reading The Last Managerial Search
