TWINS TRIVIA is hopefully a fun and informative site that will help you to better enjoy the Minnesota Twins and their wonderful history. “History never looks like history when you are living through it” – John Gardner, former Secretary of Health
Twins rookie catcher Josmil Pinto went 3 for 4 on Monday, with all three hits being doubles, leaving him with 13 hits in 23 at-bats, a .565 batting average, in seven games in the major leagues. Since 1980, only one player has had at least 20 at-bats and a higher batting average than Pinto in his first seven games in the big leagues; Jay Bruce was 15 for 26 (.577) at that point of his career.
Hot starts with minimum of 20 at-bats for the Twins rookies
Jose Reyes snapped a scoreless tie with his RBI double off Jared Burton in the eighth inning and he came around to score an insurance run in the Blue Jays’ 2-0 win at Minnesota yesterday. With his loss on Sunday, Burton’s record fell to 2-9 this season, a major-league high for losses by a reliever. Burton’s nine losses match the most for a Minnesota reliever in any of the last 29 years. Two other Twins absorbed nine losses out of the bullpen in one season since 1985: Rick Aguilera (4-9 in 1998) and Matt Guerrier (6-9 in 2008).
If you look back through the Twins entire history going back to 1961 you will find that “Iron Man” Mike Marshall hold the Twins record for most losses by a reliever not starting a single game with 12 in the “L” column. There are some pretty good relievers on this list and it goes to show that won/lost records for relievers mean very little. The list below reads like a list of “Whose Who” of Minnesota relievers.
On this day in 1954 the Washington Senators played a black ballplayer for the first time. His name was Carlos Paula and he was not African American, he was from La Habana, Cuba. The 26 year-old Paula started in left field for the Senators seven years after Jackie Robinson made his major league debut. Paula went 2 for 5 with a double and knocked in 2 runs in a 8-1 win in game one of a DH against the Philadelphia A’s. The Senators lost game two by a 3-2 score at Griffith Stadium. Only 4,865 fans were on hand to witness this historic occasion.
Paula was acquired by the Washington Senators from the Paris Indians of the Big State League in an unknown transaction after the 1953 season. Paula’s major league career lasted just three seasons and 157 games, all with the Senators from 1954-1956. Paula played in the minors after that from 1957-1959 for the Philadelphia A’s, New York Yankees, New York Giants, Cincinnati Reds and Milwaukee Braves organizations but never again had a chance to play in the majors. Paula played his final season (1960) in Mexico City. Carlos Paula had a career batting average of .271 in 457 at-bats with 9 home runs and 60 RBI.
According to the SABR bio on Zoilo Versalles the Twins shortstop who was the 1965 AL MVP both he and Carlos Paula lived in the same neighborhood. As a youngster Versalles patterned his play after flashy Almendares star shortstop and active major leaguer Willy Miranda who many consider to have been the slickest fielding shortstop ever born in Cuba. Versalles also received encouragement and inspiration from another neighborhood big-leaguer, Carlos Paula, who once gave the young hopeful one of his tattered and discarded fielder’s mitts.
Only the Yankees in 1955, the Phillies in 1957, the Tigers in 1958 and the Red Sox in 1959 broke the color-line later than did the Senators/Twins franchise.
The Twins have hit three gand slam home runs so far this year. Five Twins players (Allison, Carew, Hrbek, Puckett and Hunter) have each hit three grand slam home runs in a single season. Eighty one different Twins players have hit home runs in a Twins uni with the bases loaded but only 33 players have done it more then once. But who is the Twins king of the grand salami? What Twins player has hit the most career grand slam home runs wearing a Twins uniform?
Who has hit the most grand slam home runs since 1961 you ask? None other then Alex Rodriguez who has 23. But then again how many would have he had hit if he had not juiced…. Manny Ramirez is next with 21.
Kevin Chapman‘s wild pitch scored Ryan Doumit with the go-ahead run in the 12th inning of the Twins’ 9-6 win at Houston. The last time Minnesota won a game in this manner was on September 20, 1984, when the White Sox’ Bert Roberge wild-pitched home Tom Brunansky in the 13th inning at the Metrodome.
Ron Gardenhire
The Twins are now 8-7 in extra-innings this season. Since the start of the 1961 season, the Twins have an all-time extra-inning record of 384-345-2. Twins Manager Ron Gardenhire seems to like extra-inning baseball and has a career-record of 107-72, a .598 winning percentage since he took the managers job in 2002. Gardy is just 7 wins short of getting 1,000 wins as a manager, I think he is going to get it soon. A real nice achievement!
Did you know that prior to the Twins retiring Bert Blyleven‘s number 28 that it was the lowest number that no MLB team had retired?
Brian Dozier hit home run number 17 last night and is the all-time Twins leader in home runs hit by a second baseman in a single season. Dozier now has 51 extra base hits this season, the only Twins second baseman with more are Chuck Knoblauch with 53 in 1994 and 1995, Todd Walker with 56 in 1998 and the leader is Chuck Knoblauch with 62 in 1996.
The Twins finished August having struck out 291 times in 30 games, the highest total of strikeouts by any team in one month in major-league history. That works out to 9.7 strike outs per game. When you attend a Twins game be sure to hold on to your hat cause there is a lot of whiffing going on.
Only one player in Twins history has won the Twins team triple crown by leading the team in home runs, RBI, and average, who was he?
The Twins seven minor league teams finished the 2013 regular season with a 411-345 record, good for a .544 winning percentage. Not too shabby at all. The AAA-Rochester Red Wings at 77-67, the High A-Ft. Myers Miracle at 79-56 and the Cedar Rapids Kernels at 88-50 are all play-off bound. The only teams with losing records were the AA-New Britain Rock Cats at 66-76 and the Rookie league GCL Twins at 28-32. The Rookie league Elizabethton E-Twins finished their season at 37-31, good for third place. The DSL (Dominican Summer League) Twins finished in fourth place with a 36-33 record. Since 2000, the Twins minor league teams have had a losing record twice, in 2010 and 2011. If you are interested in learning more about the Twins minor league history, stop by http://wp.me/P1YQUj-1jd .
Chris Colabello, making his third start at first base since Justin Morneau was traded to Pittsburgh, connected for a tie-breaking ninth-inning grand-slam homer to propel the Twins to a 10-6 comeback victory at Houston. Colabello, who had homered earlier in the game, became the first player in the history of the franchise – not just in Minnesota since 1961, but going all the way back to Washington in 1901 – to hit two homers in a game, including a go-ahead grand-slam in the ninth inning or later.
Coming into Colabello’s ninth-inning at-bat, the 29-year-old rookie was batting .186 overall, and had been held hitless in his 25 major-league at-bats with runners on base and two outs. The last position-player to start his big-league career with such a long streak of hitless at-bats in those situations was Chris Gimenez, a catcher with the Indians, who went hitless in his first 31 at-bats with runners on base and two outs over 2009 and 2010.
Kevin Correia threw seven innings and recorded 14 outs on groundballs in his win over the Rangers on Sunday. Correia induced two double-play grounders, bringing his total for the season to 23, which now leads all American League pitchers. Mariners teammates Felix Hernandez and Joe Saunders, who shared the A.L. lead with 22 apiece entering play on Sunday, are now tied for second place.
From Elias yesterday –
Matt Garza had nine strikeouts in his seven innings against the Twins, the highest strikeout total for any pitcher in any of Saturday’s major-league games. But when the day, and the month, were done, major-league pitchers finished August with an average of 14.945 strikeouts per game, the sixth-highest average in any month in major-league history in which at least 100 games were played. And, yes, it’s our end-of-the-month duty to note that the streak continues: the 12 months with the highest strikeouts-per-game averages in major-league history (minimum: 100 games) are the last 12 months: September of 2011, all six months of last season, and the five months played so far this season.
The Twins got themselves their own piece of strikeout history: with 11 strikeouts on Saturday night – nine at the hands of Garza and two more by Joe Nathan – the Twins finished August having struck out 291 times in 30 games, the highest total of strikeouts by any team in one month in major-league history.
New Britain (AA – Eastern League) third baseman Miguel Sano is the Twins Minor League Player of the Week. In six games for the Rock Cats, Sano hit .333 (7-for-21) with four home runs, eight RBI, two doubles, seven walks and scored five runs. The 20-year old from San Pedro De Macoris, Dominican Republic is in his fourth season of pro ball and has hit a combined 35 home runs and knocked in 103 runs between Single-A and Double-A this season. Baseball America has listed Sano the Twins top prospect each of the last two seasons.
Fans in Minnesota who are tired of watching the home team struggle to score runs are hoping that the Twins will make Miguel Sano a September call-up and allow him to win the third base job during spring training in 2014. I too would love to see what Sano can do against big league pitching this year at Target Field but I don’t see it happening no matter how much the Twins could use his bat.
The M&M era ended when the Twins announced on Saturday afternoon that they had traded 1B Justin Morneau to the Pittsburgh Pirates for outfielder Alex Presley and a PTBNL or cash. Morneau has always been one of my favorite Twins players but it was time for the Twins to trade Morneau who was in the final year of his contract and at least get something for him before he became a free agent at the end of the season.
Justin Morneau
The Canadian born Morneau was selected by Minnesota in round 3 of the 1999 June amateur draft as a catcher. Morneau hurt his elbow in the Instructional League and was given a first baseman’s mitt after catching just 22 minor league games. Morneau advanced through the system quickly and on June 10, 2003 made his major league debut as the DH by going 2 for 4 (singled in first at-bat) for manager Gardenhire in a Twins 5-0 loss to the Colorado Rockies at the Metrodome. Morneau became the Twins regular first baseman on July 16, 2004 and has held that job ever since. Injuries have haunted Morneau since 2009 and he has not played more than 135 games since 2008 but he was on pace to surpass that number this year. Most people don’t realize that prior to his run of injuries Morneau played day in and day out and still holds the Twins record for consecutive games played with 319 between June 29, 2007 and June 20, 2009.
In his 11 years in a Twins uniform Morneau who is 32 has played in 1,278 games and has hit .278 with 221 home runs (third on the Twins all-time list) and 860 RBI’s in 4,749 at-bats. Morneau, a four-time all-star had 100 or more RBI’s four years in a row from 2006-2009. His best season was in 2006 when he hit 34 home runs and knocked in 130 and these numbers earned him the AL MVP award. Morneau worked hard to learn how to play first base and made himself a very good first baseman although a Gold Glove eluded him.
Alex Presley
The Twins received 28 year-old outfielder Alex Presley (bats and throws left-handed) from Pittsburgh. Presley was the Pirates eighth round pick in 2006 and made his debut with the Bucs in 2010. Presley has yet to spend a full season in the majors and has played a total of just 204 games with 656 at-bats in four seasons hitting .261 with 16 home runs and 19 stolen bases. Presley has a career OBP of just .299 and has struck out 138 times. Presley is not considered much of a prospect and is probably best suited to be a fourth or fifth outfielder. Presley is expected to join the Twins once the rosters are expanded on September 1st.
I will miss Justin Morneau and we wish him the best in Pittsburgh where the Pirates will hopefully go deep in the playoffs. Personally I think it would be fun to watch a Pirates and Tigers World Series.
Duke Welker
UPDATE AS OF OCTOBER 5 – The Twins & Pirates anounced that the player to be named later was 27-year old RHP Duke Welker. According to GM Terry Ryan, the Twins and Pirates agreed at the time of the trade on a group of players that the final player traded would be drawn from. The choice of which one to send to Minnesota was Pittsburgh’s.
Josmil Pinto
The Twins also announced that they recalled catcher Josmil Pinto from Triple-A Rochester. Pinto appeared in 126 games this season between Triple-A Rochester and Double-A New Britain, hitting .309 (141-for-456) with 32 doubles, 15 home runs and 74 RBI. He was hitting .314 (22-for-70) with nine doubles, one home run and six RBI in 19 games for Rochester. The 24-year old from Valencia, Venezuela was signed by the Twins as a free agent on February 14, 2006 and was added to the Twins 40-man roster in November. Pinto will wear uniform number 43.
