Byron Buxton and Brian Dozier win Gold Gloves

Congratulations to Byron Buxton and Brian Dozier on their 2017 Gold Gloves awards.

Minnesota Twins outfielder Byron Buxton and second baseman Brian Dozier have been named recipients of the 2017 American League Rawlings Gold Glove Award at their respective defensive positions. This marks the first time that either player has earned the award.

The only other Twins second baseman to win a Gold Glove was Chuck Knoblauch in 1997 and the last time a Twins outfielder won a Gold Glove was Torii Hunter in 2007. Previous to Buxton and Dozier winning Gold Glove awards this season, you have to go all the way back to 2010 when Joe Mauer won it as a catcher.

You can view all the previous Minnesota Twins Gold Glove winners on our Twins Awards page.

Pat Neshek – former Twins pitcher & card collector

Pat Neshek was born in Madison, Wisconsin but attended Park Center High School in Brooklyn Park, Minnesota where he was an all-state pitcher. The Minnesota Twins drafted Neshek in round 45 after Neshek graduated from high school in 1999 but he said no to pro ball and went on to attend Butler University. The Twins drafted him again in 2002, this time in the sixth round and this time the Twins got their man. 

Like a lot of Twins before him, Neshek started his pro career in Elizabethton and worked his way up the big league ladder until he made his major league debut on July 7, 2006 at Ameriquest Field in a 9-4 Twins loss to the Rangers. Pat pitched the final two innings for the Twins keeping the Rangers off the board allowing just one hit and striking out one of the seven batters he faced.

Neshek pitched for the Twins from 2006-2010 but missed the entire 2009 season due to injury. The Twins lost Neshek in March 2011 to a waiver claim by the San Diego Padres. Since then Neshek has been in high demand as a reliever pitching for the Padres, The A’s, the Cardinals, and this past season for the Phillies and the Rockies. Neshek, now a two-time all-star has 11 big league seasons in the books and expects to pitch in the majors in 2018 barring anything unforseen.

Todate Neshek has pitched in 494 games and has a 33-22 record with an outstanding 2.75 ERA. In 445.2 innings Neshek has struck out 447 batters…. The Twins could use him in their bullpen in 2018.

Neshek is an avid card collector and has his own website at www.patneshek.com .

Redbirds’ Neshek is a real card … collector, that is

Pat Neshek, Card Collector

 

Twins all-opponent team right fielder

Right Field – Magglio Ordonez – Actually a pretty  easy pick even though there have been many good right fielders that have played against Minnesota. Here are just a few of them, Reggie Jackson, Dwight Evans, Al Kaline, Jermaine Dye, Jay Buhner, Ichiro Suzuki, Paul O’Neill, Tim Salmon, Danny Tartabull and of course Manny Ramirez just to name a few. These guys bring back some memories don’t they? Many of them bad ones.

Ordonez played in the bigs for all or parts of 15 seasons splitting his time with the White Sox (8 years) and Tigers (7 years) before retiring after the 2011 season. In 2007 while playing for the Detroit Tigers, Ordonez hit a league leading 54 doubles and his .363 average was the best in the league earning him runner-up (to A-Rod) in the AL MVP voting. Magglio Ordonez was a six-time All-Star and three-time Silver Slugger award winner.

Ordonez played 181 games against Minnesota and hit .326 with an OPS of .919 in 746 PA’s. Throw in his 44 doubles, 36 home runs and 136 RBI and you have one tough hombre.

 

Our previous selections for the Twins all-opponent team

Catcher – Ivan Rodriguez

First Baseman – Paul Konerko

Second Baseman – Lou Whitaker

Third Baseman – Wade Boggs

Shortstop – Cal Ripken

Left Field – Jim Rice

Center Field – Fred Lynn

Twins all-opponent team center fielder

Center Fielder – Fred Lynn – What the heck is going on here? Another Boston Red Sox? There have been some great center fielders that have played against our favorite team the Minnesota Twins. What about players like Amos Otis, Paul Blair, Chet Lemon, Ken Griffey Jr., Kenny Lofton, Bernie Williams, Willie Wilson and I could go on and on.

Nope, the Twins all-opponent CF is Fred Lynn. Lynn was originally a New York Yankee third round selection in 1970 but he said no and went on to USC. In 1973 the Red Sox selected Lynn in round two, six picks after the Twins chose shortstop Ed McMahon, a Sporting News All-American out of the University of Massachusetts who they started out in AAA Tacoma in 1973 with the likes of Tom Kelly (I bet that was interesting). Then the Twins sent him to A ball in 1974 and after that season he was history. Did Ed McMahon going on to fame on the Johnny Carson TV show, no, that would be another Ed McMahon. Our man Fred Lynn however; had a cup of coffee with the Red Sox in 1974 and then went on to win the ROY award in 1975. In his first game against the Twins he went 2 for 4 with a run scored, and hit a two-run home run off Dave Goltz. 1975 turned out to be a pretty good season for Lynn, in addition to his ROY award he was also the AL MVP, an All-Star and a Gold Glove winner. During his 17 year career with five different teams he went on to be a nine-time All-Star, four-time Gold Glover and for good measure he won the AL batting title in 1979.

Against the Minnesota Twins Lynn played in 130 games and hit .331 with an OPS of 1.054. Lynn had 160 hits against Minnesota pitching with 33 doubles, 38 home runs and 122 RBI. As a Baltimore Oriole in 1985 he walked-off the Twins on successive nights. On May 10 he hit a walk-off home run off Twins closer Ron Davis and on May 11 he hit another walk-off home run, this time off Twins reliever Curt Wardle who was brought in to replace Ron Davis on the mound.

According to the ever humble Fred Lynn,

“I really didn’t have any holes in my game other than the fact that I couldn’t stay on the field for the second half of my career.”

If you are a Twins fan you just gotta hate a guy like that…..

 

Our previous selections for the Twins all-opponent team

Catcher – Ivan Rodriguez

First Baseman – Paul Konerko

Second Baseman – Lou Whitaker

Third Baseman – Wade Boggs

Shortstop – Cal Ripken

Left Fielder – Jim Rice

Twins all-opponent team left fielder

Left Fielder – Jim Rice is my choice here but it just as easily have been Carl Yastrzemski, Rickey Henderson, Alex Gordon or Joe Rudi. Rice, a Hall of Famer was a Boston first round selection in 1971 as a high school outfielder and debuted in 1974. Rice was the 1978 AL MVP, an eight-time All-Star and he won two silver slugger awards. Rice wasn’t known as the friendliest player around but we are not giving away any congeniality awards here, we are looking for the Twins all-opponent team and Rice fits that description well. Did I mention that he walked off the Twins twice during his career?

In 470 PA’s against Minnesota scored 83 times and hit .335 with an OPS of .975. Twenty seven of his home runs came off of Twins pitchers as he notched 94 RBI against Minnesota.

 

Our previous selections for the Twins all-opponent team

Catcher – Ivan Rodriguez

First Baseman – Paul Konerko

Second Baseman – Lou Whitaker

Third Baseman – Wade Boggs

Shortstop – Cal Ripken

Twins all-opponent team shortstop

Shortstop – Cal Ripken was the Orioles second round selection (48th overall) in the 1978 June amateur draft. With the Twins first round pick (16th overall) in that same draft the Twins chose shortstop Lenny Faedo. But don’t feel bad because in the first round the Orioles chose infielder Robert Boyce who only reached as high as “A” ball.

You might think that picking the shortstop for this team would be easy but you would be wrong, it was difficult and I almost selected Omar Vizquel but finally decided on Ripken primarily because of his power and ability to show up and play every day. The numbers that Ripken and Vizquel put up against Minnesota were almost identical except in power and speed. They were both great players.

Ripken a Hall of Famer was the 1982 ROY award winner beating out Kent Hrbek and Wade Boggs. During his 21 year career he was a two-time MVP, 19 time All-Star (every year except his rookie season), 8 time Silver Slugger, and a 2 time Gold Glove winner not to mention a host of other awards.

But what did Ripken do against Minnesota that earns him the right to be a part of the Twins all-opponent team? Well, he went to the plate 725 times and had a .307 average with 197 hits, 47 doubles, 24 home runs, 105 RBI, with an OPS of .874. Not too shabby for a shortstop, plus the Twins decided to give him 15 IBB to make sure he didn’t do even more damage.

Looks like it is time to look at the outfielders.

 

Our previous selections for the Twins all-opponent team

Catcher – Ivan Rodriguez

First Baseman – Paul Konerko

Second Baseman – Lou Whitaker

Third Baseman – Wade Boggs

 

The Twins all-opponent team third baseman

Third Base – Wade Boggs is my pick today but when you have to choose among players like Brooks Robinson, George Brett, Sal Bando, Graig Nettles, Buddy Bell, Doug DeCinces, Carney Lansford, Adrian Beltre, and Josh Donaldson it is no easy task and on another day it might have been one of the others. It is tough to go wrong here.

Boggs who many knew as the chicken man played in the big leagues for 18 season with the Red Sox (1982-1992), the Yankees (1993-1997) and the Tampa Bay Devil Rays (1998-1999). Boggs was elected to the Hall of Fame in 2005, selected as an All-Star 12 times, won five batting titles, eight Silver Slugger awards, and was a two-time Gold Glove winner.

He showed the Minnesota Twins no mercy in the 162 games he played against them hitting .344 with an OPS of .870. In his 730 PA’s against Minnesota he had 220 hits of which 42 were doubles, 7 triples, 5 were home runs and he walked 82 times to boot. In his 162 games against the Twins he went hitless just 24 times and on May 20 and May 31 of 1986 he had five hits in each game.

Wade Boggs is an interesting person and was a very good baseball player, if you would like to learn more about him, check out his SABR Bio.

 

Our previous selections for the Twins all-opponent team

Catcher – Ivan Rodriguez

First Baseman – Paul Konerko

Second Baseman – Lou Whitaker

The Twins all-opponent team second baseman

Second Base – Lou Whitaker was the Tigers fifth round in the 1975 draft and went on to become the 1978 AL Rookie of the Year, a five-time All-Star, a four-time Silver Slugger winner, and a three-time Gold Glove winner. Sweet Lou played in the big leagues for 19 years, all with the team that drafted him and in his 2,308 games, all but 32 (DH) were as a second baseman.

Whitaker played 162 games against the boys from Minnesota hitting .298 with an OPS of .832. His 172 hits included 34 doubles, seven triples and 14 home runs. Whitaker walked off the Twins twice, both times with singles off of closers Mike Marshall and Ron Davis. To show the respect that Twins managers had for Whitaker, you don’t need to look any further than the 10 IBB that Twins pitchers issued to Whitaker. Whitaker is one of only 15 players to have been given 10 or more IBB by Twins pitchers since 1961.

The runner-up for this spot is Roberto Alomar who put up similar numbers against the Twins over the years. I could have gone either way with these two players, one is a Hall of Famer and the other should be a Hall of Famer. Whitaker has a career WAR of 74.9 and Alomar has a WAR of 66.8. To be honest and fair, I see each player with a strike against them in the fact that one spit in an umpires face and the other didn’t stand for the national anthem. I know it has nothing to do with their play against the Twins but this Twins all-opponent team is strictly my opinion, my list and it is what it is. You are always welcome to express your opinion as well.

The unapproachable greatness of Sweet Lou

 

Our previous selections for the Twins all-opponent team

Catcher – Ivan Rodriguez

First Baseman – Paul Konerko

The Twins all-opponent team first baseman

First Base – Paul Konerko – He was selected by the Los Angeles Dodgers with the 13th pick in the first round of the 1994 amateur draft. In 1997, he was named the Minor League Player of the Year by Baseball America and Baseball Weekly and was named Pacific Coast League MVP .

This 6 time All-Star spent 18 seasons in the big leagues starting his career as a Dodger in 1997 (55 games) before being traded to the Redlegs (26 games) for a brief stay and then again being traded, this time to the White Sox where he menaced the Twins for 16 years before he hung up his spikes after the 2014 season. He played 212 games against Minnesota reaching base via a hit 222 times with 31 doubles and 5 triples and hit .286 (OPS of .850) with 43 home runs and 110 RBI. Runner-up is Miguel Cabrera in a very close call.

Our previous selections for the Twins all-opponent team

Catcher – Ivan Rodriguez

The Twins all-opponent team catcher

The Twins have called Minnesota home for the past 57 seasons of major league baseball. You might argue that during some of those years the home town bunch wasn’t of major league caliber but the same can be said of some of the opposing teams.

Regardless of how good or bad some of the Twins opponents  have played, every team has had players that enjoyed hitting against Twins. These were the guys that killed the Twins in one fashion or another season after season and we hated seeing them step into the batters box because we know the results were not going to be pretty. We hoped that they would retire or be traded to the National League but then inter-league play came into existence and that option went away. 

Having said all that, if you are a baseball fan you can look back and say that “he might have been a thorn in the Twins side but he was one hell of a baseball player”. So here is the Twinstrivia.com Minnesota Twins all-opponent team catcher. We are going to do this one position at a time over the next week or two. I am certainly interested in your thoughts and opinions or share a memory or two and thanks for stopping by.

Catcher – Ivan Rodriguez – This Hall of Famer spent 21 years in the big leagues and was an All-Star 14 times, he won 13 Gold Gloves, 7 Silver Slugger awards and was the American League MVP in 1999. His career caught stealing percentage was 46%. Rodriquez spent 13 years with the Texas Rangers but also played for the Tigers, Nationals, Yankees, Astros and Marlins. Rodriquez’s son Dereck was a Minnesota Twins sixth round selection in the 2011 draft as an outfielder but several years into his career the Twins persuaded Dereck Rodriguez to try pitching and this past season he pitched for AA Chattanooga.

So why did he make our Twins all-opponent team? Against Minnesota, “Pudge” played in 160 games, had 640 at bats and hit .313 with an OPS of .854. Rodriguez had 200 hits of which 28 were doubles, 5 triples, 29 home runs and 92 RBI. Runner-up is Carlton Fisk.

SABR article about Ivan Rodriguez by Steve West