On August 23, 1965 the Twins were in their fifth season in Minnesota ready to take on the New York Yankees in a 3:10 start at Met Stadium in front of 37,787 fans that wanted another Twins win over the hated Yankees. The Twins had a 7.5 game lead and were well on their way to their first World Series. That same day Tony Oliva became the first Twins player to grace the cover of Sports Illustrated magazine. I would urge you to take a few minutes and read a story about the Twins in that SI issue called “Everybody Pick up a Drum” by William Leggett. It is a nice piece of writing about the Minnesota Twins and it mentions a huge trade that owner Calvin Griffith had cooked up with the New York Mets that was all but signed sealed and delivered prior to the 1965 season but the Mets backed out at the last-minute and the rest is history as they say. Had that trade gone through, you can bet your bippy that the Twins history would show the Minnesota Twins appearing in only two World Series (1987 and 1991) versus three. It just goes to show that some of the best trades are the ones that you don’t make, I can attest to that with my experiences with trades in fantasy baseball over the years. If you care at all about Twins history you will check out this story.
By the way, you can read this issue of Sports Illustrated cover-to-cover by clicking on the SI magazine cover above.