Looking back at the Minnesota Twins in the 60’s

The Minnesota Twins started play in 1961 after moving from Washington D.C. where they were known as the Washington Senators. In their final year as the Senators in 1960 the team had a 73-81 record. Between 1946 and 1960 they had one, just one, winning season and that was in 1952 when they barely made it over the .500 mark with a 78-76 record.

Nevertheless the baseball fans of Minnesota were excited about getting a major league team (some might disagree with that description) to move to their state. Team owner Calvin Griffith felt he had some good young players that were just starting to make their mark.

The 1961 team was managed by Cookie Lavagetto until he was fired by Griffith after a 23-36 start and replaced by coach Sam Mele. The team went on to finish seventh in the ten team American League with a 70-90 mark and 38 games out of first place. The team won 91 games in both 1962 and 1963 but in 1964 they fell back to a 79-83 record and fans were calling for manager Mele to hit the road. However; Griffith stuck with his man and in 1965 Mele’s Twins won 102 games and found themselves in the World Series playing the Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale led Los Angeles Dodgers. The Twins came out on the short end of that Series losing four games to three but baseball was exciting in Minnesota. 

The 1966 Twins were not able to defend their 1965 pennant and finished with a 89 win season but they were nine games behind the Baltimore Orioles. The 1967 season saw the American League with a pennant race like none before it with the Red Sox, Twins, Tigers, White Sox and Angels battling down to the very end of the season. The Twins started the season at just 25-25 and that was not what the Twins owner was expecting so he fired Mele and brought Cal Ermer to lead his team. The team responded to Ermer and had a one game lead with two games to play with the Red Sox at Fenway Park and they lost both games allowing the Red Sox to win the 1967 AL pennant by one game over Minnesota and Detroit, three games over the White Sox and 7.5 games over the Angels.

The Twins started the 1968 season with six straight wins, five of them on the road but that was their high-water mark for the season and when the season ended so did the managing career of Cal Ermer. Less than two weeks later Calvin Griffith hired Billy Martin as his new manager.

1969 saw the AL break in two divisions with the Twins being part of the six team AL West along with the Oakland Athletics, Chicago White Sox, California Angels, Seattle Pilots, and the Kansas City Royals. 1969 was also the first season that had a best of five ALCS. In this case the West Division winning Twins played the East Division winning Baltimore Orioles and the Twins lost all three games. They lost the first game in Baltimore in 12 innings 4 to 3, the lost game two again in Baltimore in 11 innings 1 to 0 and their third and final game was a blowout 11-2 loss at the Met when Billy Martin went on a hunch and started Bob Miller, a part-time starter/reliever and he lasted just 1.2 innings. Martin’s decision to start Miller turned out to be one of the key reasons he would be fired by Griffith after just one season.

The Twins played winning baseball (.542) in the 60’s and had a record of 789-666. So who were the key Twins hitters and pitchers in the Twins first decade of baseball in the Minnesota? It is difficult to determine the value that a player brings to the team without being arbitrary so the best way that I know of to measure a players worth is WAR. I know of lot of you either don’t like it and don’t know how it is calculated exactly (either do I), but if we apply the same measurement to everyone it will serve our purpose here. The position player with the highest WAR for the period of 1961-1969 probably is no surprise to anyone, it is Hall of Famer Harmon Killebrew and the pitcher for that same time period is Jim Kaat.

 

Twins Top Ten Position Players by WAR (1961-1969)

Minnesota Twins Harmon Killebrew smiles as he holds three bats in the dressing room after hitting three homers and wrested the American League lead from Dick Stuart of the Boston Red Sox, 43 to 42, in the first game of their twin bill at Fenway Park in Boston on September 21, 1963. Killebrew hit two solo homers and his third with two runners aboard. Minnesota won the first game 13 to 4. (Pioneer Press library archive AP/file photo)

 

Results
Rk Player WAR/pos From To G R H HR RBI SB BA
1 Harmon Killebrew 42.8 1961 1969 1305 780 1209 362 933 11 .266
2 Tony Oliva 31.9 1962 1969 912 545 1094 132 535 75 .308
3 Bob Allison 30.3 1961 1969 1189 633 984 210 635 59 .255
4 Zoilo Versalles 15.3 1961 1967 1065 564 1046 86 401 84 .252
5 Cesar Tovar 15.1 1965 1969 631 346 620 25 189 117 .271
6 Jimmie Hall 14.8 1963 1966 573 282 507 98 288 23 .269
7 Earl Battey 14.4 1961 1967 853 297 768 76 350 8 .278
8 Rich Rollins 11.9 1961 1968 888 395 830 71 369 15 .272
9 Rod Carew 10.1 1967 1969 387 191 428 17 149 36 .299
10 Don Mincher 8.7 1961 1966 590 220 369 90 265 4 .244
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 11/20/2018.

.

Twins Top Eleven Pitchers by WAR (1961-1969)

Jim Kaat

 

Results
Rk Player WAR From To G GS CG SHO W W-L% SV IP ERA
1 Jim Kaat 23.9 1961 1969 340 307 102 16 141 .553 5 2173.2 3.22
2 Jim Perry 20.6 1963 1969 261 135 35 11 74 .622 4 1117.0 2.88
3 Camilo Pascual 18.2 1961 1966 184 179 72 18 88 .607 0 1284.2 3.31
4 Dean Chance 13.1 1967 1969 104 93 34 11 41 .547 2 664.0 2.67
5 Dave Boswell 13.0 1964 1969 169 135 37 6 64 .577 0 967.2 3.28
6 Jim Merritt 11.4 1965 1968 122 89 28 6 37 .474 6 686.2 3.03
7 Al Worthington 10.1 1964 1969 327 0 0 0 37 .544 88 473.1 2.62
8 Jack Kralick 7.8 1961 1963 77 75 19 4 26 .500 0 510.1 3.74
9 Dick Stigman 6.8 1962 1965 138 85 26 4 37 .500 7 643.2 3.69
10 Mudcat Grant 6.0 1964 1967 129 111 36 10 50 .588 1 780.2 3.35
11 Ron Perranoski 5.1 1968 1969 141 0 0 0 17 .500 37 206.2 2.53
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 11/21/2018.

.

Best War by Year

 

1961 – Harmon Killebrew at 5.7 and Jack Kralick at 6.0 (league leading)

1962 – Bob Allison at 4.6 and Camilo Pascual and Jim Kaat, both at 5.3

1963 – Bob Allison at 7.4 (league leading) and Camilo Pascual at 6.1 (league leading)

1964 – Tony Oliva at 6.8 and Jim Kaat at 3.0

1965 – Zoilo Versalles at 7.2 (league leading) and Jim Perry and Mudcat Grant at 2.6

1966 – Tony Oliva at 6.4 and Jim Kaat at 4.5

1967 – Harmon  Killebrew at 6.5 and Jim Merritt at 6.6 (league leading)

1968 – Cesar Tovar at 4.7 and Dean Chance at 6.2

1969 – Harmon Killebrew 6.2 and Jim Perry at 6.3

 

Harmon Killebrew had a WAR of 4.0 or higher seven times from 1961-1969 followed by Tony Oliva with five, Bob Allison with four, Jimmie Hall with three, Cesar Tovar with two and Earl Battey, Rod Carew, Leo Cardenas, and Zoilo Versalles with once each.

Jim Kaat had a WAR of 3.0 or higher five times from 1961-1969 followed by Jim Perry and Camilo Pascual with three, Dean Chance and Dave Boswell twice, and Bill Dailey, Dick Stigman, Jack Kralick, Jim Merritt, Lee Stange, Pedro Ramos and Ron Perranoski with once each.

 

Almost all data retrieved in this article is via the Baseball-Reference Play Index.)

 

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

 

German born Navy vet 65-68 and served aboard the Shangri La CVA-38. I run https://Twinstrivia.com, best MN Twins historical web site there is. Stop by daily and check out OTD in Twins history and much more. Live in Minnesota and Florida depending on what time of the year it is.