Tag: Calvin Griffith

Forty Years Ago

November 18, 2009 – The 1968 Minnesota Twins finished with a 79-83 record under manager Cal Ermer and finished a disappointing seventh in the ten team American League, a full 24 games behind the first place Detroit Tigers and owner Calvin Griffith decided he had seen enough even though stars like Harmon Killebrew, Tony Oliva, and Jim Kaat had suffered injuries that caused them to miss numerous games. On October 11th he fired manager Cal Ermer and hired the brash Billy Martin who had been managing the Twins AAA team in Denver to skipper the 1969 Minnesota Twins. 1969 would be an exciting season for Minnesota, they had a young new manager and would begin play in the newly formed Western Division of the American League along with the Oakland A’s, the California Angels, the Kansas City Royals, the Chicago White Sox, and the Seattle Pilots. 1969 brought two new teams to the American League, the Kansas City Royals who were replacing the A’s who had packed their bags and moved to Oakland under owner Charlie Finley and the Seattle Pilots who it turns out would only stay in Seattle for one season before moving to Milwaukee and becoming the Brewers.

The Twins 1969 season got off to a rough start for Billy’s boys when they lost their first two games of the season on the road to the expansion Royals, both losses coming in extra innings. They moved on to California and lost their next two games by scores of 5-3 and 4-3 and found themselves in the basement of the Western Division. But Martin got his team on the straight and narrow and the team ripped off 7 wins in a row and took over 1st place. They finished the month of April 13-7 and were sitting on top of the division. From April 26th through July 3rd the team was either first or second in the standings. Oakland came to town on the 4th of July week-end and the Twins whipped Charlie Finley’s boys 3 straight and outscored the A’s 30 to 11 and took over first place, a spot they would keep for the rest of the season. The Twins finished the season with a 97-65 record, 9 games ahead of the second place Oakland A’s. Although Martin had the team running (4th in stolen bases), the team finished first in the league in hits, runs, doubles, total bases, and batting average. The Twins pitching wasn’t too shabby either as Jim Perry and Dave Boswell each finished with 20 wins and threw 250+ innings and Ron Perranoski was great out of the bullpen pitching 119+ innings in 75 games finishing 52 of them and getting credit for 31 saves.

The Twins would go on to lose their first league championship series to the Baltimore Orioles in a 3 game sweep but that is a whole different story that we will talk about in the future. Just a week after losing the final game of the championship series, Billy Martin is fired by owner Calvin Griffith and Bill Rigney was named the Twins new manager. Roy Blount Jr. of Sports Illustrated did a nice story on Billy Martin and the Twins in the July 21, 1969 issue and you can read that story by clicking on the SI magazine cover.

They Said It

July 4, 2009 – Here are some fun and interesting quotes pertaining to the Minnesota Twins/Washington Senators that I found in The Sports Illustrated archives.

Frank Kostro, Minnesota Twins utility man: “So far I’ve played right, left and first base and I’m Polish. Does that make me a utility pole?” – 4/29/1968

Mickey Mantle, injured Yankee, after batting practice at the Minnesota Twins’ Metropolitan Stadium: “This is the greatest home-run stadium I’ve ever seen. If this were my home park I’d hit 90 homers some year.” – 7/29/1963

Dick Erickson, head groundkeeper at Met Stadium in Bloomington, MN. asked what his job would be if the Twins and Vikings move into a domed stadium in 1981: “I guess I’ll just scrape the bubble gum off the field.” – 12/18/1978

Dave St. Peter, Twins president, on having real grass in the ballpark that Minnesota plans to open in 2010: “It will be a great joy to see somebody riding a mower instead of a vacuum cleaner.” – 9/24/2007

Sam Mele, to his family after he was fired by the Minnesota Twins: “What are you crying for? All these years you’ve been saying you’d like to have me home for the summer. Well, that’s where I’ll be now.” – 6/19/1967

Ellis Clary, Minnesota Twins scout, whose team is in the thick of its divisional race despite one of baseball’s lowest payrolls: “We’ve got the only players who’ll make more in their World Series shares than in salary.” – 8/6/1984

Calvin Griffith, 285-pound former owner of the Minnesota Twins upon running into equally hefty Craig Kusick, a onetime Twins first baseman who now teaches high school phys ed: “You and I should attend some of your classes.”

Ron Davis, former Minnesota Twin reliever who had a knack for giving up late-game homers, on the boos he still hears at appearances in the Twin Cities: “When it’s 10 years later and they still hate you, that’s what you call charisma.” – 2/20/1995

Mrs. Laura Quilici, hearing that her son Frank had been named manager of the Minnesota Twins: “Oh, the poor kid. He’s going to get an ulcer now.” – 7/17/1972

Jim DeShaies, Minnesota Twin pitcher on ignoring baseball tradition and changing his seat in the dugout during teammate Scott Erickson’s recent no-hitter: “I think everybody gets caught up in superstitions. But I don’t put much stock in them—knock on wood.” – 5/16/1994

Tony Perez, Cincinnati Reds coach, on wire-service reports that pitcher John Smiley was unhappy about his trade from the Pittsburgh Pirates to the Minnesota Twins: ” John Smiley is going to change his name to John Frowny.” 4/6/1992

Don Baylor, Minnesota Twins DH, on why he would say no if George Steinbrenner offered him the Yankees’ managing job: “I came into this game sane, and I want to leave it sane.” – 10/19/1987

Cookie Lavagetto, manager of the likely last place Washington Senators, after reprimand by Commissioner Ford Frick for saying the Yankees would win pennant by 15 games: “I wanted to get them overconfident so we could beat them.” – 4/14/1958

Billy Gardner, Minnesota Twins manager, on outfielder Darrell (Downtown) Brown, who has hit one home run in 591 career at bats: “That must be an awful small town.”

Tom Kelly, Minnesota Twins manager, explaining why he made pitcher Pat Mahomes walk off the field with him after pulling him during a 17-1 loss to the Detroit Tigers: “Then we would have to take only half the boos each.” – 5/10/1993

Junior Oriz, Minnesota Twins catcher, after teammate Scott Erickson threw a two-hitter for his 12th straight win: “He’s unbelievable. He’s like that guy in Texas who’s 41, or 42, or 43.”

Sam Mele, ousted Minnesota Twins manager, asked what he had noticed most about the club this summer: “They got going right after I left.” – 9/25/1967

Gene Mauch, Minnesota Twins manager, on having a blood relative, Roy Smalley on his team: “Sometimes I look on Roy as my nephew, but sometimes only as my sister’s son.” – 5/26/1980

Hal Naragon, Minnesota Twins catcher, on whether Boston’s Carl Yastrzemski will turn out to be the Red Sox new Ted Williams: “He’s like Ted from the shoelaces down.” – 9/18/1961

Gene Mauch, of the Minnesota Twins, who is in his first year as an American League manager: “I’ve seen more inferior umpiring so far this season than I saw in 16 years as a manager in the National League.” – 7/19/1976

Calvin Griffith, president of the Washington Senators, who once promised to keep the club in Washington “as long as I live,” in an amendment: “As long as we make a living.” – 7/14/1958

The Cuban Senators

June 9, 2009 – A nice story written by Matt Welch a number of years ago for ESPN.com that I think is worth your read. The story is about the Washington Senators ties to Cuban ballplayers such as Julio Becquer, Pedro Ramos, Camilo Pascual, Tony Oliva and numerous others. The relationship of super Cuban scout Papa Joe Cambria and the numerous players he signed to major league contracts is also looked at. The story ends with a “feel good” moment that shows once again that Calvin Griffith was not the ogre that many made him out to be. Click here for the story.

The Last of the Pure Baseball Men

January 16, 2009 – It was a sunny but cold day in January and I was researching some historical Minnesota Twins information on the Internet when I ran across a wonderful story about Calvin Griffith, the original owner of the Minnesota Twins and the man responsible for bringing professional baseball from Washington to the Midwest and to the twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul. It made no difference that Metropolitan Stadium the ballpark that the Twins would call home was actually miles away out by the airport and located somewhere out amongst the cow pastures in a suburb called Bloomington. Sadly, today that stadium is gone and now occupied by the Mall of America and the Twins are playing baseball on the concrete floor within the confines of the domed and climate controlled Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome.

The story “The Last of the Pure Baseball Men” was written by Michael Lenehan and published in the August 1981 Atlantic Monthly. Although a rather lengthy article, it is a fun and informative read as it looks at the life and times of the legendary Minnesota Twins owner Calvin Griffith. The story covers Calvin’s life and to a great degree I think explains why Mr. Griffith ran the club as he did. The article mentions many of the Twins former players and talks about their relationships with Calvin. Calvin Griffith has been gone now for a number of years and Carl Pohlad who bought the Twins from Calvin also recently has passed away.

I think as you read the article you can’t help but go back in time and picture in your mind what baseball was like in the 50’s, the 60’s and the 70’s. Back when players played for fun and pride and not the almighty dollar. Back when you knew that the players you watched come up from the minors would play for the home team for years to come unless they were traded. Sure, you had spring training hold-outs, but you didn’t have arbitration and the constant talk of how much an up-and-coming star was going to take to sign or you will lose him to free agency and the larger market teams. I am not condoning some of the practices of the owners back then because they obviously were unfair and you could argue they got what they deserved but now I think the pendulum has swung a bit too far to the players side. From my perspective as a baseball fan, baseball is still the best sport but the greed from both the ownership and the player’s side is wearing my patience a bit thin.

As I look out the window, it is a beautiful sunny day albeit a -5 degrees here in Plymouth, Minnesota and I can’t wait to hear the crack of the bat as the baseball goes flying out of the ballpark when spring training opens for MLB in just a few short weeks. In the mean time, take a few minutes and check this story about Calvin, his family, and his Minnesota Twins. In a way this is really a fitting time for this story, the article was originally written in 1981 as the Twins prepared to open their final season at Met Stadium and today we find ourselves in the same position as the Twins are getting ready to open their final season, this time in the Metrodome before they move to Target Field and play out door baseball once again in 2010.

You can find “The Last of the Pure Baseball Men” written by Michael Lenehan on his web site by clicking on his name, I hope you enjoy the article as much as I did.

Senators Fun Facts

August 28, 2008 – Walter Johnson was the only pitcher elected to the MLB Hall of Fame at its inception. Johnson won 20 or more games 12 times in his career and 30 or more games twice. He started 666 games in his career and completed 531 of them.

Roy Sievers hit 42 home runs in 1957 and was the only Washing Senator to ever win the American league home run title outright.

Senator third baseman Eddie Yost set an American league record by hitting 28 homeruns as a leadoff batter.

One time Twins owner Calvin Griffith served as the Senators batboy on their 1924 World Series Championship team. Calvin’s father Clark owned the team.

Senator’s catcher Morris “Moe” Berg became a renowned author and master spy for the US government. Berg, a graduate of Princeton University and Columbia Law School was known as the “brainiest man in baseball”, spoke several languages and reportedly read at least 10 newspapers a day.

On May 11, 1897, Senators catcher Duke Farrell set a Major League Baseball record that has stood for more than 100 years by catching eight of nine opposing players who attempted to steal a base.

“The Last of the Pure Baseball Men”

January 12, 2008 – On October 26, 1960, Calvin Griffith, President of the Washington Senators, made the historic decision to move his club to the Minneapolis/St. Paul area, thereby giving birth to the “Minnesota Twins,” named after the two Upper Midwest cities. Won the American League pennant in 1965; however, they lost to the Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series that year. Voted “Major League Executive of the Year” – 1965. Reputed to be “one of baseball’s most astute judges of raw talent”; in 1964, he discovered and signed Rod Carew a second baseman and one of the most famous of former Twins players. On June 23, 1984, prominent local businessman Carl Pohlad stepped forward and signed an agreement in principle to purchase the team for $32 million from Griffith and his sister, Mrs. Thelma Griffith Haynes, and keep the Twins in Minnesota. On September 7, 1984 the deal was finalized ending an era of 72 years in which the Griffith family controlled the ball club. On October 20, 1999, the man who brought big league baseball to Minnesota died at the age of 87. Calvin Griffith died in his retirement home in Melbourne, Florida, of kidney infection.

I had an opportunity to do a telephone interview with Calvin in the late 1980’s when I was taking some classes at North Hennepin Community College and I need to interview an executive so I choose Calvin Griffith. I got his number from the phone directory and gave him a call in Florida. Calvin answered the phone and I told him who I was and why I was calling and he could not have been any nicer. I don’t know if he was lonely or just loved talking about baseball but he did not want to hang up the phone. We talked about his career and the state of baseball and it was one of the most fun class assignments I ever had. By the time we had this conversation, he and Carl Pohlad had some kind of a falling out and Calvin was bitter about how Pohlad and the Twins were treating him but the man still knew and loved baseball and nothing and no one could keep him away from the game he loved. I had told him about the time when the Met was being readied to be demolished and the Twins had a huge auction of everything and anything that was still left and how I had ended up somehow in the bowels of the old Met and stood outside an office door where Calvin and his cronies were telling old baseball stories, smoking cigars and tipping a few cold drinks. Those were some great stories but many could not be repeated in public today. How the times have changed, I have to wonder what Calvin Griffith was say about the steroid and HGH controversy of today.

If any of you are interested in knowing more about Calvin and the impact he had on baseball in Minnesota, find a copy of “Calvin – Baseball’s Last Dinosaur” by Jon Kerr, it is a fun read. I have a copy signed by both Calvin and Jon sitting on my bookcase and I take it out now and then and read a chapter or two.