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
Max Kepler homered twice in a seven-RBI performance, while Miguel Sano contributed a home run and three RBIs to the Twins’ rout of the Rangers. Kepler and Sano are the first pair of teammates–each age 23 or younger–to combine for 10 RBIs in a game in which they each homered since Chipper Jones and Ryan Klesko did that for the Braves in 1995. Before the Atlanta duo, you have to go back to Andre Dawson and Ellis Valentine of the 1977 Expos, and then Lou Gehrig and Tony Lazzeri with the 1927 Yankees to find pairs of that kind.
Max Kepler’s seven RBI yesterday afternoon set a Twins single-game rookie record for RBI. The previous three to have a share of the record of six were Tony Oliva May 7, 1964 against Los Angeles-AL; Oswaldo Arcia September 22, 2013 against Oakland; and Miguel Sano August 12, 2015 against Texas.
Jaylin Davis is second in the Appalachian League with 11 RBIs in nine games. (Bryan Green/MiLB.com)
Elizabethton Twins (Rookie ball) outfielder Jaylin Davis is the Twins minor league Player of the Week. Davis appeared in seven games for the E-Twins, hitting .320 (8-for-25) with five home runs, nine RBI, eight runs scored and three walks. The Greensboro, North Carolina native, who turned 22 on Friday, is in his first season in the Twins system after being drafted in the 24th round of the 2015 First-Year Player Draft out of Appalachian State University.
Ian Desmond‘s tenth-inning home run was the game-winner for the Rangers in their 3-2 triumph at Minnesota yesterday. Brian Dozier extended his career-best hitting streak to 13 games by going 1-for-4 with a single, but it snapped his streak of 11 consecutive games with at least one extra-base hit, which tied the longest streak of that kind in American League history. The only other AL players with 11-game extra-base-hit streaks were Hank Greenberg (1935), Jesse Barfield (1985) and Alex Rodriguez (2006 to 2007).
Brian Dozier extended to 11 his team-record streak of consecutive games with an extra-base hit by belting a fourth-inning home run at Chicago on Thursday. It’s the longest streak by any major-league player since Alex Rodriguez had an 11-game streak overlapping the 2006 and 2007 seasons; and it’s the longest in the majors by a middle infielder since the Hall-of-Famer Rogers Hornsby, like Dozier a second baseman, produced at least one extra-base hit in each of 12 consecutive games in 1928. That was The Rajah’s only season playing for the Boston Braves; his extra-base-hit streak began on May 27, a couple of days after he became the team’s manager in addition to being its second baseman.
Dozier has accumulated 20 hits, including six homers, over his last 11 games. The last four Twins players who produced those totals over an 11-game span were all boldface names: Joe Mauer(2009), David Ortiz (2002), Dave Winfield (1993) and Kirby Puckett (1987).
Twins reliever Kevin Jepsen will be 32 years old in a month or so and he is pitching in his ninth season in the big leagues. Jepsen was selected in the second round by the Angels in 2002 and the Twins selected Jesse Crain just a few picks later. Like most pitchers, Jepsen started his career as a starter but was moved to the bullpen full-time in 2006 and he has not started a game since.
The Twins acquired Jepsen in a trade with Tampa for prospects Chih-Wei Huh and Alexis Tapia at the trade deadline in 2015. Not unlike many of the relievers in MLB, Kevin Jepsen has had an up and down career. Very few relievers are consistent from year to year and if they are, they usually find themselves in a closer’s role.
Jepsen was a godsend for the Twins last season when he pitched great as the 8th inning guy before taking over the closer role from Glen Perkins in mid-August. 2016 has been one of those bad seasons for Jepsen from day 1. Jepsen has lost his closer role now but he has appeared in 32 games this season and pitched 29.2 innings. In his 29+ innings Jepsen has given up 42 hits and 12 walks and given up 22 runs, 21 of them earned. The man has pitched horrendously for the Twins while getting paid $5.3 million.
So what do you do with him? Why keep a reliever who is pitching poorly even if he is making a modest $5.3 million? But who will take a reliever off your hands that has given up 42 hits in 29+ innings and has a 6.37 ERA? Jepsen has pitched one clean (no hits or walks) inning in his last 23 appearances going back to April 25th. The Twins may not get much in return but there are teams that would take a chance on Jepsen because it is not unheard of for players like Jepsen to turn their year around with a change in scenery and he is a free agent after this season. Even if the Twins can’t get anyone to take Jepsen than just dump him and you still win, there has to be some minor league pitcher in the Twins system that deserves a look.
UPDATE: Kevin Jepsen was designated for assignment on July 3, 2016.
Brian Dozier hit two home runs and knocked in four runs in the Twins’ 4-0 win over the White Sox last night. It marked the ninth consecutive game that Dozier delivered an extra-base hit, tying the Twins franchise record in that category. Mickey Vernon had a double, triple or homer in nine consecutive games for the then Washington Senators in 1953. Prior to Dozier, the last major-league player to produce an extra-base hit in at least nine consecutive games while starting at second base in each game during the streak was Chase Utley in 2008.
Dozier broke the Twins record of eight consecutive game XBH that was previously held by Harmon Killebrew (1970) and Tony Oliva (1969). Another long time record bites the dust……
A total of 52 homers pushes June’s average into near-record territory
Fifty-two home runs were hit on Sunday in MLB, the most on any single day in more than 10 years since June 11, 2006, to be exact, when 54 home runs were hit. This is just the latest example of the dramatic increase in the home-run rate over the first three month of this season, from 2.09 per game in April, to 2.28 in May, to a near-record 2.52 this month.
In fact, there have been only two months in the history of major-league baseball in which the per-game home-run average was as high is it has been this month (minimum: 10 games played). Those were the first two months of the 2000 season, at the height of home-run hysteria: 2.56 in April and 2.64 in May.
Twins shock Yankees with home-run blitz
The Twins defeated the Yankees, 7-1, yesterday in a game that proved the rule about the futility of trying to predict baseball. Minnesota arrived at Yankee Stadium with the lowest winning percentage in the majors (.311). But the Twins hit six home runs, which was their highest total in any game since 2007 and, perhaps more impressive, the highest total in franchise history in any of their 1887 games against the Yankees (including 1903 through 1960 as the Washington Senators). The last team with the worst record in the majors to hit six homers in one game was Tampa Bay in 2002 at Kansas City.
Rochester Red Wings (AAA) right-handed pitcher Jose Berrios is the Twins minor league Player of the Week. Berrios made one start for the Red Wings on Thursday at Columbus, pitching 8.0 scoreless innings, with three hits allowed,two walks and nine strikeouts, earning the win. In his last four starts for the Red Wings, Berrios has gone 3-1, 2.51 ERA (28.2 IP, 8 ER) with eight walks and 32 strikeouts. In 10 starts for the Red Wings this season, he is 6-3, 2.92 ERA (61.2 IP, 20 ER) with 25 walks and 67 strikeouts, while holding opponents to a .199 batting average.
Berrios had a brief stint with the Twins earlier this year when he made his major league debut on April 27 but he was not particularly effective so he was sent back to Rochester. His next call-up by the Twins which should be soon could be the one where Berrios comes up to stay for a long time. What have the Twins got to lose, let him come up and polish his skills at Target Field.
Pitcher Brian Duensing was a 2005 Minnesota Twins third round compensation selection for the Twins losing free agent shortstop Cristian Guzman to the Washington Nationals. Duensing signed with Minnesota for a reported bonus of $400,000 and began his ascent to the big leagues with the Elizabethton Twins and debuted in relief with the Twins on April 10th, 2009 in a 12-5 Twins victory at US Cellular Field. Originally a starting pitcher, the Twins used him as a spot starter and reliever from 2009-2012 before moving him to the bullpen full-time late in 2012.
After appearing in 354 Twins games from 2009-2015 and posting a 41-37 record with 2 saves and a 4.13 ERA it became time for the Twins and the 32 year-old left-handed Duensing to part ways. I recently ran across a Q&A that Duensing did with FanGraphs discussing the opt out and how he used it during his free agency which was a first for him in his baseball career. It shows how baseball isn’t always a bowl of cherries for everyone.
June 24, 1968 – In a one game series, the Twins beat the Chicago White Sox 1-0 in County Stadium in Milwaukee in a game called after 5 innings due to rain. The reason the game was played in Milwaukee was that in 1968, Bud Selig, a former minority owner of the Milwaukee Braves who had been unable to stop the relocation of his team three years earlier, contracted with the Allyn brothers who owned the White Sox to host nine home games (one against each of the other American League clubs) at Milwaukee County Stadium as part of an attempt to attract an expansion franchise to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Box score
