Some days home plate seems the size of a postage stamp to Twins pitchers and here are some of those days. The most walks a Twins pitcher has issued in one game stands at nine and five Twins pitchers have met that fate. The last time it happened was back in 1987, I can just see TK and pitching coach Dick Such in the dugout now. Maybe that is when the Twins implemented their pitch to contact plan. What I think is odd is that in four of the five instances the Twins ended up winning the game. The only time it happened in a home game was Jim Hughes effort in 1975 at the Met. One of the games, the Jim Roland effort was a shutout. Baseball is a strange game!
| Rk | Player | Date | Opp | Rslt | App,Dec | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | HR | BF | AB |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Juan Berenguer | 1987-06-02 | BOS | L 5-6 | GS-4 | 3.2 | 3 | 4 | 4 | 9 | 5 | 0 | 24 | 14 |
| 2 | Jim Hughes | 1975-07-19 | NYY | W 2-1 | GS-9 ,W | 8.2 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 9 | 6 | 0 | 41 | 30 |
| 3 | Tom Hall | 1970-09-23 | OAK | W 7-4 | GS-8 ,W | 7.2 | 2 | 4 | 4 | 9 | 9 | 2 | 34 | 25 |
| 4 | Luis Tiant | 1970-05-05 | DET | W 8-5 | GS-6 ,W | 5.2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 9 | 4 | 1 | 28 | 19 |
| 5 | Jim Roland | 1963-04-21 (1) | CHW | W 7-0 | SHO9 ,W | 9.0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 9 | 7 | 0 | 38 | 29 |
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 8/15/2013.
On the other hand, the Twins record for most consecutive games without issuing a free pass belongs to Joe Nathan who did not issue a base on balls for 27 consecutive games (25.1 innings) between 9/2/2004 – 5/7/2005. The record holders for this feat within a single season belongs to Casey Fien who went 20 games (18.2 innings) without a walk from May 28th through July 13th earlier this season and Rick Aguilera who went 20 games (19 innings) from 4/25/1994 – 6/24/1994. The major league record holder in this category is Dennis Eckersley who went 41 games and 50 innings without a free pass from 8/17/1989 – 6/10/1990.
I miss the good ole days of twins baseball with Kirby Puckett and Juan Berenguer.