Roberto Alomar, a 12-time All-Star and 10-time Gold Glove winning second baseman, and Bert Blyleven, a 287-game winning pitcher who ranks fifth on the all-time strikeout list, were elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. Blyleven, who garnered 79.7% of the votes, pitched in 22 seasons with the Minnesota Twins, Texas Rangers, Pittsburgh Pirates, Cleveland Indians and California Angels and compiled a 287-250 record with a 3.31 ERA, 242 complete games, 60 shutouts and 3,701 strikeouts in 4,969 1/3 innings. The right-hander pitched a no-hitter on Sept. 22, 1977 for the Rangers against the Angels and shares the AL single-game record for the longest one-hit complete game of 10 innings June 21, 1976. He, too, was a key part of two World Series champions, the 1979 Pirates and the 1987 Twins.
Tag: Angels
Albert Pujols becomes an Angel, but not in my eyes
It is all but official the way I see it, 1B Albert Pujols, soon be 32, has left the World Champion St. Louis Cardinals to sign a 10 year deal worth in excess of $250 million with the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. As a long time fan of baseball I find this signing disgusting, I hate what baseball and baseball players have become, money hungry mercenaries. I know, I know that this is baseball in 2011 but that does not mean that I have to like it and as a baseball fan I have a right to express my feelings.
Pujols has been a Cardinal icon for 11 years and to see him forget his roots and take the Angels deal for a few million dollars more than the Cardinals were supposedly offering makes me sick. The man has banked over $104 million dollars in career earnings with the Cards and now he drops his allegiance like a hot potato. We have all heard it before, but how much money does a person really need? I have seen where Albert Pujols has done a lot of community work but actions speak louder than words and his decision to leave St. Louis, a great baseball city for a few dollars more shows me nothing but greed, straight out-and-out greed. How else can you explain it to me?
When you think of the Cardinals of the current era you think of Pujols, same as you think of Jeter or Mantle with the Yankees, Puckett with the Twins, Banks as a Cub, or Ripken with the Orioles, that is the way it should be. It killed me to see Harmon Killebrew as a Royal, Carew as an Angel, Wade Boggs as a Devil Ray or Steve Carlton as a Twin, that is just plain wrong and to me Pujols should have stayed a Cardinal. This is not a new problem, it has been going on for a long time but it seems to be getting worse.
Baseball should come up with something like a “franchise icon” label that will allow teams to keep a true icon player as a member of their organization during their entire playing career. I am not saying they should not be fairly compensated, I am sure something could be worked out that would be fair for everyone but come up with a plan that will allow teams to keep their icons where they belong. There are a lot of smart baseball people out there, come up with a plan that will allow fans to once again be allowed to grow old with their baseball heroes.
GM Ryan busy, Twins sign Ryan Doumit
Holy Cow, GM Terry Ryan has been busy, on the job less than two weeks and he has signed Jamey Carroll and now today the Twins announced they have signed C/1B/OF Ryan Doumit to a $3 million one year deal pending a physical. The deal apparently has some incentives and that is a good thing because the switch-hitting Ryan Doumit comes to Minnesota with some baggage. Injury type of baggage, in the form of a concussion history and that is not a good thing for a catcher.
Doumit was drafted in the 2nd round of the 1999 June free agent draft by the Pittsburgh Pirates as a catcher and has been in the Pirates organization ever since. Doumit made his major league debut in June of 2005. Although not rated as a strong catcher defensively, in his 7 big league seasons Doumit has played in 521 games but he has caught in 426 games, played the OF in 60 and played 1B in 35 games. Injuries have limited Doumit’s time in the line-up and he has never had more than 465 plate appearances in any of his 7 big league seasons.
OK, Ryan Doumit has an injury history but he is still a very nice pick-up and worth the gamble as I see it. Doumit has suffered injuries such as a broken thumb, broken wrist, and a fractured ankle not to mention the concussion issues I brought up earlier. He can play three positions and is a switch-hitter and will be 31 when the season starts in April. He has a little pop in his bat as his 67 home runs in 611 games attest and he has a .271 career average although he did hit only .250 in 2009, and .251 in 2010 but he hit .303 in 77 games last year.
I like the signing but if you think this will send Drew Butera packing you need to think again. Doumit is weak defensively and his strength is offense so there is no way that Gardy keeps him on the bench strictly as a back-up catcher day in and day out. Doumit will be in the line-up some where most of the time so Gardy still needs to have a back-up catcher available and that man will probably be Butera or another catcher with some defensive skills. If Doumit is the DH, Gardy will not want to risk losing his DH if he would suddenly need Doumit to catch. Even if Butera fails to make the team, I see no way the Twins do not carry three catchers next year. In spite of needing to carry three catchers, I like this signing and I give GM Ryan a big thumbs up. Keep working those phones Mr. Ryan, a starting pitcher would be nice and the outfield is still a big question mark.
The Twins also announced they have signed yet another relief pitcher to a minor league deal, this time it is former Angel Jason Bulger. Jason is a right hander and stands 6’4″ and goes about 210 and will be 33 in a couple of weeks. Bulger has been in the big leagues off and on with the D-Backs and the Angels since 2005 but has only appeared in 125 games with a 7-2 record. Bulger is another of those relief pitchers with control issues as his career mark of 5.1 BB/9 will tell you.
Finally, the Twins also announced that they plan to add another bronze statue of a former player outside Target Field next year but as yet the player has yet to be publicly identified. He would join statues of Harmon Killebrew, Kirby Puckett, Rod Carew, Tony Oliva and the late Twins owner Carl Pohlad and his wife Eloise. Who is it going to be? My guess would be Bert Blyleven and my dark horse choice would be Kent Hrbek. We will find out soon enough.
UPDATE November 23 – The Twins announced that they have officially signed free-agent catcher Ryan Doumit to a one-year deal worth $3 million.
AL Division Series appearances
September 3, 2011 – Since the Division Series format started in 1995, only two AL teams have not participated, the Kansas City Royals and the Toronto Blue Jays. The number of appearances for the rest of the AL teams are listed below.
| Team | Division Series appearances |
|---|---|
| Yankees | 15 |
| Red Sox | 9 |
| Indians | 7 |
| Twins | 6 |
| Angels | 6 |
| A’s | 5 |
| Mariners | 4 |
| Rangers | 4 |
| White Sox | 3 |
| Orioles | 2 |
| Rays | 2 |
| Tigers | 1 |
According to Elias
April 9, 2011 – Carl Pavano allowed one run on four hits in 8 innings of work in the Twins’ 2-1 victory over the A’s in the team’s home opener at Target Field on Friday. Since the Twins moved to Minnesota in 1961, only two other pitchers have pitched at least 8 innings while allowing four-or-fewer hits and one-or-fewer runs in the team’s home opener: Tom Hall in 1969 (9 IP, 2 hits, 0 runs against the Angels) and Kevin Tapani in 1990 (8 IP, 4 hits, 0 runs against the Angels).
How they will finish in 2011
March 31, 2011 – I know the season started today and I am a bit slow with my predictions for this year but here is how I see things playing out. Sorry to say, but I don’t see the Twins winning the AL Central this year, the new champs of the Central will be those “dag nabbit” Mighty Whitey’s. I see the Chicago White Sox as just beating out the Twins by 1 ½ games in a season long battle for supremacy. But things aren’t all bad, as the Twins will be the American league wild card winners for the first time in their history. Here is how I see the Division races ending up.
| Finish | AL East | AL Central | AL West |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Red Sox | White Sox | Rangers |
| 2 | Yankees | Twins * | A’s |
| 3 | Rays | Tigers | Angels |
| 4 | Orioles | Royals | Mariners |
| 5 | Blue Jays | Indians | |
| Finish | NL East | NL Central | NL West |
| 1 | Braves | Reds | Rockies |
| 2 | Phillies * | Cardinals | Giants |
| 3 | Marlins | Brewers | Padres |
| 4 | Nationals | Cubs | Dodgers |
| 5 | Mets | Pirates | D-Backs |
| Astros |
* – Wild Card Winner
The Twins will make some progress in the playoffs this year but they will only win one series and get beat out in the ALCS by the Boston Red Sox who will face the Atlanta Braves in the World Series. The Boston Red Sox will become the World Champions in 5 games.
Manager longevity
November 28, 2010 – I thought it would be interesting to see where the Twins managers stood in terms of games managed and to also take a look at the last fifty years in the American League to see how many managers the various teams have had since 1961.
The Twins have only had 12 managers in their entire history and only two since Tom Kelly took over from Ray Miller late in the 1986 season. Kelly is still far and away the longest tenured Twins manager and on the other end of the spectrum, Cookie Lavagetto only managed the Twins for 66 games in their inaugural season but it needs to be mentioned that he coached the Washington Senators from 1958-1960 before the team relocated to Minnesota. Kelly himself has managed almost 30% of the games the Twins have played and when you look at Kelly and Gardenhire together, these two men have managed 48.3% of all the Twins games since 1961.
| Rank | Manager | Twins game managed |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tom Kelly | 2,384 |
| 2 | Ron Gardenhire | 1,459 |
| 3 | Sam Mele | 953 |
| 4 | Gene Mauch | 772 |
| 5 | Billy Gardner | 621 |
| 6 | Frank Quilici | 567 |
| 7 | Bill Rigney | 392 |
| 8 | Cal Ermer | 274 |
| 9 | Ray Miller | 239 |
| 10 | Billy Martin | 162 |
| 11 | John Goryl | 72 |
| 12 | Cookie Lavagetto | 66 |
When you look at the rest of the AL Central Division between 1961 and 2010 the longest tenured managers were Tigers skipper Sparky Anderson with 2,473 games between 1980-1995, Indians skipper Mike Hargrove with 1,227 games between 1992-1999, current White Sox skipper Ozzie Guillen with 1,135 games between 2004-Present, and Royals skipper Dick Howser with 769 games between 1981-1986.
Looking at the entire American League for the last fifty years, the Twins rank first, meaning they have had the least amount of managers per years played and thus have the highest average numbers of years managed per manager. I am not sure that means anything when you see the New York Yankees sitting at the bottom of the list with 25 managers in 50 years but it is still fun to look at. I didn’t count some interim managers that managed just a handful of games for their teams when the regular managers were away for a variety of reasons. It just shows that managers are hired to be fired and it is rare when a manager gets to walk away from the game by his own choosing.
| Rank | Team | # of managers | Average years per manager | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Minnesota Twins | 12 | 4.17 | |
| 2 | Tampa Rays | 4 | 3.25 | Joined league in 1998 |
| 3 | Detroit Tigers | 17 | 2.94 | |
| 4 | Toronto Blue Jays | 12 | 2.83 | Joined league in 1977 |
| 5 | Boston Red Sox | 18 | 2.77 | |
| 5 | Chicago White Sox | 18 | 2.77 | |
| 5 | Baltimore Orioles | 18 | 2.77 | |
| 8 | Los Angeles Angels | 22 | 2.27 | |
| 9 | Kansas City Royals | 19 | 2.21 | Joined league in 1969 |
| 10 | Cleveland Indians | 23 | 2.17 | |
| 11 | Seattle Mariners | 16 | 2.13 | Joined league in 1977 |
| 12 | Texas Rangers | 19 | 2.05 | Joined league in 1972 |
| 13 | Oakland A’s | 25 | 2.00 | |
| 13 | New York Yankees | 25 | 2.00 |
Lenny Green – One of the original Twins
November 13, 2010 – The Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) is a great organization and one of the wonderful projects they have going on is the Baseball Biography Project. One of the many biographies they have completed is about former Minnesota Twins outfielder Lenny Green. Leonard Charles Green was born January 6, 1933 in Detroit, Michigan. Lenny signed with the Baltimore Orioles as a amateur free agent prior to the 1955 season and made his major league debut in August of 1957. Green was traded to the Washington Senators during the 1959 season and played for the Senators for two years before the team moved to Minnesota and became the Twins. Green had good seasons for the Twins in 1961 and 1962 before losing his job to Jimmie Hall in 1963. Lenny was part of a big three team trade in 1964 and wound up with the Angels who gave him little playing time before selling him back to his original team in Baltimore. The next spring, 1965, he was again sold, this time to the Reds Sox. Green played for the Red Sox for two years and then finished his career with his home town Detroit Tigers in 1966 and 1967. Take a few minutes and read about one of the original Minnesota Twins by clicking here. I am not sure why right now but back in 1961 when the Twins played here in their first season, I was 13 years old and Lenny Green was my first “favorite” Twins player.
Did you know?
November 7, 2010 – That prior to the advent of interleague play, the Twins were the only team in MLB history to play a regular season game and a World Series road game in the same ballpark. The American League Los Angeles Angels/California Angels played in Dodger Stadium from 1962 through 1965. In 1965, the Twins were 4-5 against the Angels at Dodgers Stadium but when they played the Los Angeles Dodgers at Dodgers stadium in the 1965 World Series they lost all three games in that same stadium.
Twins bring in another closer
August 27, 2010 – The Twins announced today that they have acquired 35 year old left-handed closer Brian Fuentes from the Los Angeles Angels for a player to be named later (to be named by October 15). Fuentes had 23 saves in 27 opportunities with the Angels this season after leading the AL in saves in 2009 with 48. Fuentes, nicknamed T-Rex, had a 4-1 record in 39 games with an ERA of 3.52 and a WHIP of 1.20 to go along with 39 strikeouts and 5 home runs allowed. Gardenhire has stated that Capps will retain the closer role and Fuentes will be primarily a set-up guy but he will get some closing opportunities if Capps is used too many days in a row. This is Fuentes’s tenth big league season and he does have 186 lifetime saves pitching for the Mariners, Rockies, and the Angels. So now the Twins have ties to 4 closers if you count Nathan who is out for the year in Rauch, Capps, and Fuentes. Fuentes will be available for Saturday’s game so a roster move will be required, probably after today’s game against the Mariners. Fuentes has about $1.89 million due him this year but he will probably not meet the required 55 games finished to trigger his $9 million vesting option for next season. Sure looks like the Twins are “going all in” this year.