Ricky Nolasco earned career win #100 in the Twins’ win over the Red Sox. Nolasco is the 14th pitcher to earn career win #100 while wearing a Twins uniform, and ten of them did it in a home game. Some notable pitchers whose 100th career win came as a Minnesota Twins player are Camilo Pascual (1963), Mudcat Grant (1966), Jim Kaat (1967), Dean Chance (1968), Jim Perry (1968) and Frank Viola (1988). Source: ELIAS
Tag: Jim Kaat
Time getting short to vote for Twins franchise four
VOTING ENDS MAY 8, 2015
Shutouts – For and against the Twins
Twins shutout leaders (8 or more innings)
| Rk | Player | #Matching | W | L | GS | IP | H | BB | SO | SB | CS | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bert Blyleven | 29 | 29 | 0 | 29 | 263.0 | 132 | 42 | 209 | 0.66 | 11 | 17 |
| 2 | Jim Kaat | 23 | 23 | 0 | 23 | 208.0 | 131 | 25 | 124 | 0.75 | 3 | 5 |
| 3 | Camilo Pascual | 18 | 18 | 0 | 18 | 162.0 | 78 | 33 | 144 | 0.69 | 5 | 1 |
| 4 | Jim Perry | 17 | 17 | 0 | 17 | 153.0 | 83 | 29 | 95 | 0.73 | 2 | 4 |
| 5 | Frank Viola | 10 | 10 | 0 | 10 | 90.0 | 49 | 16 | 59 | 0.72 | 2 | 8 |
| 6 | Brad Radke | 10 | 10 | 0 | 10 | 90.0 | 45 | 8 | 54 | 0.59 | 1 | 3 |
| 7 | Mudcat Grant | 10 | 10 | 0 | 10 | 90.0 | 52 | 17 | 43 | 0.77 | 1 | 4 |
| 8 | Dave Goltz | 10 | 10 | 0 | 10 | 90.0 | 37 | 19 | 67 | 0.62 | 3 | 3 |
| 9 | Dean Chance | 9 | 9 | 0 | 9 | 81.0 | 36 | 15 | 71 | 0.63 | 3 | 1 |
| 10 | Geoff Zahn | 7 | 7 | 0 | 7 | 63.0 | 37 | 10 | 38 | 0.75 | 0 | 2 |
| 11 | Scott Erickson | 7 | 7 | 0 | 7 | 63.0 | 18 | 15 | 31 | 0.52 | 1 | 0 |
A couple trivia questions for you today.
1. What two pitchers have shutout the Twins the most frequently and how many shutouts did they have against the boys from Minnesota?
2. What opposing pitcher threw the most shutouts against the Twins at Met Stadium and how many did he have?
3. What opposing pitcher threw the most shutouts against the Twins at the Metrodome and how many did he have?
The answers are:
1. Gaylord Perry and Steve Hargan each shut out the Twins five times.
2. Jim Bouton shut out Minnesota three times at the Met.
3. Scott Erickson shut out the Twins three times at the Metrodome.
This Day in Twins History – April 23 – Complete game with zero KO’s?
4/23/1961 – The Twins play their first 1-0 game in history and come up winners at Met Stadium when Jack Kralick pitches a complete game 4 hit shutout of the Washington Senators. Kralick also knocks in the Twins lone run of the game with a fifth inning single. Box score
4/23/1980 – Angels pitcher Bruce Kison settles for a one-hitter when Minnesota’s Ken Landreaux rips a double with one out in the 9th inning of California’s 17-0 romp. For Landreaux, the hit marks the beginning of a 31-game hitting streak. Box score
4/23/1982 – The Twins beat the Seattle Mariners 12-4 at the Kingdome. Twins pitcher Roger Erickson recovers after a rough first inning where he gives up 3 runs on 5 hits and proceeds to pitch a complete game. Erickson strikes out no one and gives up 13 hits and walks two more in this unusual game. It marks the only time that Erickson pitched a complete game with no strikeouts. Twins hitters were no slouches themselves as they had 18 hits and drew 6 walks. Ron Washington had 4 hits and Bobby Mitchell and Gary Ward had 3 hits apiece.
Box score . See the table below showing all Twins pitchers that have pitched a complete game with zero strikeouts.
4/23/2011 – The Twins beat the visiting Cleveland Indians 10-3 at Target Field and in the process score more than 5 runs in a game for the first time in 2011. The Twins have not scored more than five runs in any game this season (19 games), according to the Elias Sports Bureau, it is the longest such streak to start a season in Twins history, and the longest streak in franchise history (the 1909 Washington Senators failed to score more than five runs in their first 18 games).The Twins were the only team in Major League Baseball that hasn’t scored six-or-more runs in a game in 2011. Box score
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Twins pitchers that have pitched a complete game with zero KO’s
| Rk | Player | Date ? | Opp | Rslt | App,Dec | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | HR | Pit | BF |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brad Radke | 2002-05-08 | KCR | W 3-1 | CG 9, W | 9.0 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 106 | 32 |
| 2 | Allan Anderson | 1991-04-20 | CAL | L 1-2 | CG 8, L | 8.0 | 4 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 100 | 29 |
| 3 | Allan Anderson | 1988-08-04 | TOR | W 2-1 | CG 9, W | 9.0 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 102 | 29 |
| 4 | Les Straker | 1987-06-29 | KCR | L 2-3 | CG 5, L | 4.1 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 17 | |
| 5 | Ken Schrom | 1985-04-12 | SEA | L 1-2 | CG 8, L | 8.0 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 31 | |
| 6 | Roger Erickson | 1982-04-23 | SEA | W 12-4 | CG 9, W | 9.0 | 13 | 4 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 39 | |
| 7 | Paul Hartzell | 1979-04-30 | TOR | W 6-3 | CG 9, W | 9.0 | 7 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 36 | |
| 8 | Dave Goltz | 1978-06-23 | CHW | W 2-1 | CG 9, W | 9.0 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 32 | |
| 9 | Steve Luebber | 1976-09-08 | TEX | W 3-1 | CG 7, W | 7.0 | 7 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 26 | |
| 10 | Danny Fife | 1973-09-28 | CAL | W 7-1 | CG 9, W | 9.0 | 7 | 1 | 1 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 39 | |
| 11 | Jim Kaat | 1965-04-17 | CLE | W 3-0 | SHO9, W | 9.0 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 32 |
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Remembering 1965 – Part 9 – Not all peaches and cream for Versalles or Mele
Zoilo Versalles the Minnesota Twins enigmatic shortstop of the early 60’s would go on to win the 1965 American League Most Valuable Player Award at the age of 25 and become the first player in franchise history (Senators or Twins) to win that award. Versalles however; was not the easiest player to manage and was a high maintenance player as this incident in the April 17, 1965 Sporting News describes. Manager Sam Mele and coach Billy Martin worked hard to keep Zoilo on the straight and narrow and it paid off in 1965.
I was fortunate enough to get to see Versalles play and he was a skilled shortstop but his focus was not always there and that weakness led to numerous errors on routine plays. If you want to know more about the man who Twins fans called “Zorro” you might want to check out his SABR Bio.
The Sporting News also covers Don Mincher‘s request to be traded and all the rookies that were fighting to make the Twins roster that season.
By this date in 1965 the Twins had played five games, four of them at Met Stadium and had a 4-1 record putting them in a tie for first place. According to the “TWINS JOURNAL” (by John Snyder):
“A week before the Twins opener, Metropolitan Stadium was covered by five inches of snow. Rain and melting snow caused rivers to rise, turning the entire state into a disaster area. Twelve people died in Minnesota because of the floods. Due to a pair of postponements, the Twins opened the season by playing their first three games against three different teams, the Yankees, Tigers, and Indians”.
The temperature on opening day (April 12) at game-time was 44 degrees along with an 18 MPH wind. Flood waters forced Twins players Jim Kaat, Rich Rollins, Bill Bethea, and Dick Stigman to be brought to the stadium by helicopter due to rising flood waters of the Mississippi River. The Twins won their opener 5-4 in 11 innings in front of 15,388 shivering fans. The next three games at the Met due to the bad weather brought in “crowds” of 2,382, 4,492, and 3,273 fans. The Twins were happy to leave Minnesota behind and they went to New York where they beat the Yankees 7-2 on April 21. Due to the inclement weather the Twins played only five games during the first 10 days of the 1965 season.
Remembering 1965 – Part 7 – Holdouts and Hilario
As the Twins entered spring training in 1965 they faced some challenges that baseball teams do not face today. One of those challenges was the “holdout.” Agents didn’t really exist back then and arbitration was unheard of as players went head-to-head with their teams to sign a contract that both sides could live with. Back in the day, “holdouts” were commonplace as players fought with ownership for a good contract. In today’s world they never even discuss pay cuts after a player has a substandard season, back then it was common place and player salaries could be cut by as much as 20%.
Twins owner Calvin Griffith was known as one of the toughest negotiators in baseball and there was seldom a year that went by that he didn’t have some difficult salary negotiations with a number of his players, 1965 was no different as Calvin had some issues signing two of his best pitchers, Camilo Pascual and Jim Kaat.
The Cuban born outfielder Sandy Valdespino played sparingly for Minnesota between 1965-1967 appearing in 259 games. You can learn a little more about Hilario Valdespino by reading the piece about him in the March 27, 1965 issue of the Sporting News.
Twins first exhibition game on deck
The Minnesota Twins open their 2015 exhibition season by playing the Minnesota Gophers on March 4 and they will play their final spring training game on Saturday April 4th at Hammond Stadium against the Boston Red Sox. When early April rolls around we will all have a pretty good idea who will make this years opening day roster. Having said that, I don’t think that Twins fans should get too attached to the players on the opening day roster because I have a feeling that the “roster will be a-changing” and I can’t wait to see some of that new blood when it heads north to Minnesota and Target field.
The Minnesota Twins played their first ever exhibition game on March 11, 1961 at Tinker Field in Orlando. Cookie Lavagetto and his boys took on the Detroit Tigers and their first game turned out to be a 4-1 loss. Paul Giel started the game for Minnesota and took the loss and Bob Bruce who started for the Tigers was credited with the victory. You will notice in the box score that although this was the first game of spring training and players were not in the shape that they are in today that a number of the pitchers that pitched in this game logged three innings not the one inning that you will probably see tomorrow.
The box score below was provided courtesy of Stew Thornley, Thanks Stew, we appreciate it!
Remembering 1965 – considering a four man rotation – Part 5
The Minnesota Twins have a new pitching coach in Neil Allen this season. Heading into the 1965 season the Twins also had a new pitching coach and his name was Johnny Sain. It turns out that both Allen and Sain were right-handed and both pitched in the big leagues during all or parts of 11 seasons. Allen is getting his first shot as a big league pitching coach in 2015 while Sain had already served as a pitching coach for the Kansas City A’s in 1959 and the New York Yankees from 1961-1963 before he joined Minnesota in 1965 where he would last for two years before going on to serve as pitching coach for the Tigers from 1967-1969, the White Sox from 1971-1975 and the Atlanta Braves in 1977 and again from 1985-1986. Most pitchers loved Sain as their pitching coach and Twins pitcher Jim Kaat was one of those. Matter of fact, when owner Calvin Griffith and the Twins let Sain go, Kaat went public about how stupid he thought that move was but that is a another story for another time.
The Twins had switched to a five man rotation in 1962 but new Twins pitching coach Sain thought that he had the pitchers in Minnesota to go back to a four man starting rotation and it was not a hard sell. Here is a piece that appeared in the Sporting News on February 13, 1965. Feel free to click on the article a couple of times if your eyes are like mine and need a bit larger font.
Remembering 1965 – the manager – Part 3
Sabath Anthony “Sam” Mele
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.
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.
The Sam Mele SABR Baseball Biography is available here.
Hal Naragon 1965 AL Championship ring sold
A couple of weeks ago while doing some research for this site I ran across an auction web site that was selling a 1965 American League championship ring so I had to stop and investigate.
Here is how Legendary Auctions described the ring they had up for bids:
“Hal Naragon used his skills behind the plate to craft a ten-year career in the major leagues, ending his playing days in 1962 as a member of the Minnesota Twins. Immediately after that he took a job as a Twins coach and was on-hand for the teams unforgettable run to the 1965 American League championship. Offered here is Hal’s actual AL Championship Ring awarded to him for his efforts in that season that came only inches away from producing a World Series championship when Sandy Koufax downed the Twins 2-0 in a Game 7 duel with Jim Kaat. Dazzling diamond is centered on the face of this Jostens 14K ring is a brilliant round stone set upon a deep-blue background. Encircling the stone is “American League Champions.” On one shank, “MINNESOTA” is engraved above a raised “TC” logo. The bottom of the shank bears a baseball and two crossed bats with “1965” engraved within the ball. The other shank is topped with the name “NARAGON.” An image of the state of Minnesota and the Twin Cities logo is above another baseball and two crossed bats. It would seem that Hal has always appreciated how special this ring is and what it represents as he has clearly taken exceptional care of it over the past five decades. In comparing this to the one other 1965 Twins ring that we’ve seen, there is no question that this is a far superior example and it grades NM with spectacular visual qualities.
When the bidding closed, there were 14 bids and the final bid was $3,585. I am not sure why Hal Naragon who is now 86, chose to sell his 1965 AL Championship ring but to me it is always sad to see something personal like this get sold to anyone other than the person that earned it. I did an interview with Hal Naragon, who is one of the original Minnesota Twins back in September 2010 that you can listen to here.
(click on the images to make them larger)
