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
The below material came from a column that Sid Hartman wrote in the Star Tribune on August 19, 1990.
The payroll for the Twins, the American League West’s last-place team, is about $16 million, an average of more than $400,000 a player. In 1965, when the Twins won the pennant in a 10-team league with no playoffs, the payroll for 25 players was about $1.5 million, less than half what Kirby Puckett is paid per season. There wasn’t any free agency then and the reserve clause was in effect. There wasn’t any arbitration, either, and it was either take it or leave it.
How things have changed in favor of the player. Harmon Killebrew, a big star on the team, didn’t make $100,000 until 1967. And Bob Allison, another big star, earned about $35,000. The team drew 1,463,288 fans and sold only 3,318 season tickets. Owner Calvin Griffith made a lot of money.
And when members of the 1965 Twins World Series team, here to play in an old-timers game Saturday night, reminisced about winning the pennant and losing the World Series to the Los Angeles Dodgers in seven games, they had to recall that it wasn’t all peaches and cream in the clubhouse. Pitching coach Johnny Sain didn’t get along with third-base coach Billy Martin, and manager Sam Mele sided with Martin. Many times Martin and Sain almost came to blows.
The pitchers were on the side of Sain, who believed a pitcher never threw a bad pitch or lost a game. But they never would have won without Martin’s inspiration. Still, they won the pennant and might have won the World Series had Jim Gilliam not made a sensational fielding play on a hard ground ball hit to third in the fifth inning of Game 7. Gilliam handled shortstop Zoilo Versalles‘ shot toward third with Rich Rollins on first and Frank Quilici on second. The score was 2-0 at the time and that is how it ended, with Sandy Koufax winning for the Dodgers.
Yes, baseball has sure changed in the last 25 years.
Sabath Anthony “Sam” Mele was born in Astoria, New York on January 21, 1922. Sam Mele‘s parents were born in Avellino, Italy although they met in America. Mele’s mother was sister to big league brothers Al and Tony Cuccinello. Mele, a natural all-around athlete and a Queens Park baseball legend attended New York University where he lettered in both baseball and basketball but he excelled in basketball. After his time at NYU Mele served his country by joining the Marines during World War II. Mele however; wanted to play pro baseball and was signed as a free agent by the Boston Red Sox in 1946. In his first year of organized ball, Mele played 119 games for Scranton (A ball in the Easter League) hitting .342 with 18 home runs before being moved up to Louisville in the AAA American Association where he played all of 15 games. Mele made his major league debut with the Red Sox the following year against the Washington Senators on April 15, 1947. His rookie season may have been one of the best of his career as Sam hit 12 home runs and knocked in 73 runs in 123 games while hitting .302. Mele would never hit over .300 again in his 10 year major league career. During his playing career spanning 1947 to 1956, Mele, who batted and threw right-handed, saw duty with six major league clubs: the Boston Red Sox, Washington Senators, Chicago White Sox, Baltimore Orioles, Cincinnati Reds and Cleveland Indians, batting .267 with 80 home runs in 1,046 games. Sam Mele played his final major league game as a Cleveland Indian on September 16, 1956. Mele played AAA ball with for the White Sox and Athletics in 1957 and 1958 but never returned to the majors as a player.
Sam Mele in his playing days
Mele turned to coaching and served under manager Cookie Lavagetto in 1959 and 1960 for the Washington Senators before the team moved to Minnesota in 1961 and became known as the Twins. With the ‘61 Twins struggling, Calvin Griffith asked Lavagetto to take a week off to go fishing and clear his head in early June and during this period Mele filled in as manager. When Cookie Lavagetto was fired on June 23, 1961, Sam Mele who was 39 with no managerial experience stepped in as manager full-time and became the Minnesota Twins second manager. The Twins moved up two places in the standings under Mele, finishing seventh.
But the Twins, building with young home-grown players like future Hall of Famer Harmon Killebrew, Jim Kaat, Zoilo Versalles and Bob Allison, challenged the powerful New York Yankees in 1962 before finishing second. After finishing third in 1963, the team suffered through a poor season in 1964, leading to speculation that Mele would be replaced by his new third base coach, Billy Martin.
Finally, in 1965 the Twins broke the Yankees’ string of five World Series appearances by winning their first ever American League pennant and sent the Bronx Bombers on a tailspin where the New York Yankees would not appear in another World Series for 12 years. Led by Versalles, who was named the American League’s Most Valuable Player, batting champion Tony Oliva, and pitcher Mudcat Grant, who won 21 games, Minnesota won 102 games and coasted to the league title. The Yankees finished sixth, 25 games out. No Twins team has ever won 102 games since and Mele was named as the 1965 Sporting News Manager of the Year and back then there was only one manager of the year named for both the AL and NL. Minnesota took a two-game lead in the 1965 World Series, but the superior pitching of the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale and Claude Osteen took its toll, and Los Angeles won in seven games. During the 1965 season Mele was involved in a an incident with home plate umpire Bill Valentine. The usually mild-mannered Mele’s hand apparently hit Valentine’s jaw and he was fined $500 and suspended five days.
The 1966 Twins won 13 fewer games, and ended up as runners-up to the Baltimore Orioles. Mele had clashed publicly with two of his coaches, Hal Naragon and pitching tutor Johnny Sain and both were fired after the 1966 season much to the dismay of star pitcher Jim Kaat who wrote an “open letter” to Twins fans voicing his displeasure on the Sain firing. The “letter” made national news and caused a ruckus during the 1966 World Series when major league baseball wanted the World Series front and center. The club swung a major trade for pitcher Dean Chance during the offseason and unveiled star rookie Rod Carew in 1967. Hopes and expectations were high in Minnesota, but when the Twins were only .500 after 50 games, Mele was fired. His successor was not Martin, as had been anticipated, but long time minor league manager Cal Ermer. Mele’s record as a manager was 524-436 (.546). He never managed again, but returned to the Red Sox as a scout for 25 years.
Now days Sam Mele is retired and is living in Quincy, Massachusetts. I was lucky enough to interview Sam Mele back in May of 2009 and the interview is about a 1/2 hour-long so grab the beverage of your choice, sit back, relax and listen to Sam tell you a little about himself and what it was like to manage the Minnesota Twins.
The interview with Sam Mele was done in May 2009 and is about 35 minutes long.
Catcher Earl Battey played for the Senators/Twins from 1960-1967
A thousand dollars is a lot of money today but back in 1965 it was worth a whole lot more. Twins owner Calvin Griffith had a unique salary negotiation process, and it was pretty simple, “my way or the highway”. Today you get to revisit Calvin’s take on catcher Earl Battey and his weight issues prior to the 1965 pennant winning season in this issue of the January 30, 1965 Sporting News.
The 1964 Minnesota Twins were a disappointing 79-83 under manager Sam Mele after winning 91 games the previous season and they finished tied for sixth with the Cleveland Indians in the 10 team American league. Twins owner and GM Calvin Griffith felt that his team had suffered some bad luck in 1964 and he expected his team to be much improved in 1965.
The 1965 Twins would go on to win 102 games (most in franchise history) and lose only 60 in 1965 and walked away with the AL pennant seven games ahead of the Chicago White Sox. The 1965 Twins were the first Minnesota Twins team to taste post season action as they went on to play the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series that Fall but ended up losing the series in game seven to Hall of Famer Sandy Koufax. Previous to 1965 the last team in franchise history to appear in the World Series were the 1933 Washington Senators who lost that series four games to one to the New York Giants.
It will be 50 years this season since that 1965 Minnesota Twins team won 102 games and went to the World Series so this year we at twinstrivia.com are going to try to bring back memories of what transpired that year and relive 1965 as the season progresses. So follow us this season as we bring back some fun and interesting facts about that 1965 Twins team who some say was the best Twins team to ever step on a baseball diamond.
The beginning of this series starts with a page out of the January 23, 1965 Sporting News which was truly thee baseball Bible back in those days. Check out the Twins roster, I believe it has 42 players and some of the names there would never play for the Minnesota Twins and of course team owner Calvin Griffith wasn’t about to over pay his players even though team star Harmon Killebrew would become the first player in Twins history to make over $50,000 in a single season.
If you remember the 1965 Twins season and have special memories that you would like to share with today’s Twins fans please feel free to share them in the comments section. I only witnessed that season through early August of 1965 and missed the Twins post season play because I had chosen to join the US Navy and by early August I was on a train from Minneapolis to the Great Lakes Naval Training center to start boot camp. Back in 1965 Navy boot camp had no TV, radio, newspapers and certainly no computers and internet, it was all business so following the Twins run to the pennant was not in the cards for me. I hope we can bring back some great memories for you Twins fans that were lucky enough to witness that great year in Twins history.
As a side note, after boot camp was over for me in late 1965 I was assigned to Radar “A” school, again at Great Lakes and the following spring on April 16, 1966 when I did get a few hours of liberty where did I go? I went to Comiskey Park to see the Chicago White Sox play the Kansas City A’s. I remember it was kind of cool that day and of course the game went into extra innings, the White Sox won the game 2-1 in the bottom of the 11th inning on a walk-off walk of all things. Back then the White Sox let active military personnel attend the games for free I believe. Here are a few pictures I took that day of old Comiskey Park in 1966.
Comiskey Park April 16, 1966Comiskey Park scoreboard April 16, 1966April 16, 1966 White Sox host the Kansas City A’s – note the green and gold A’s in the field.
