Tag: Los Angeles Angels

Twins Trivia post season award winners

The 2012 baseball season was not a great season for the Minnesota Twins or their fans but there are teams, players and managers that had a great year and one that they will remember for a long time. Now that the regular season is complete, members of the Baseball Bloggers Association are voting for their post season award winners by picking who they feel deserved to bring home the hardware for their efforts. Here is how I see it.

American League

The Connie Mack (Top Manager) award goes to Bob Melvin of the Oakland Athletics for leading the A’s to a division championship (94-68) after the team finished with a 74-88 mark in 2011. On June 30th the A’s were 13 games out of first and had a 37-52 record after three consecutive losses to the Texas Rangers. From that point on the A’s went 57-26 and won the division title on the last day of the season. My runner-up award goes to the Baltimore Orioles Buck Showalter who took his team to a wild-card playoff spot and a second place finish in a tough division. My third place finisher was a true rookie manager, Robin Ventura of the Chicago White Sox who had never managed before and piloted his team to a second place finish when I had the White Sox picked to finish dead last in the AL Central.

The Willie Mays (Rookie of the Year) award is the easiest pick of all, the award goes to outfielder Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. Trout started the season in AAA and was called up at the end of April. Even with the late start Trout led the league in runs scored (129) and stolen bases (49) while finishing second in batting average hitting .320. Trout lead all AL rookies in every hitting category and even had the two longest rookie hitting streaks this past season. What an amazing season! My runner-up was the Oakland A’s outfielder Yoenis Cespedes who finished second to Trout in every AL hitting category except stolen bases (finishing fourth) and in any other season would have easily won the award. I have three pitchers rounding out the top 5 with the Oakland A’s Tommy Milone and  Yu Darvish finishing in a tie for third and the Minnesota Twins Scott Diamond rounding out the top five.

The Goose Gossage (Top Reliver) award goes to closer Fernando Rodney of the Tampa Bay Rays. The 35 year-old Rodney had a career year in his 10th season in the big leagues with 48 saves in 50 opportunities with 76 strikeouts in 74.2 innings and posting a 0.60 ERA with a 0.78 WHIP. Talk about lights out and to think he never had an ERA of under 2.68 any other season. The Rays signed Rodney as a free agent on January 4, 2012 for $1.75 million, what a bargain. The runner -up is the Baltimore Orioles Jim Johnson who led the league in saves with 51 in 54 chances. I have Rafael Soriano of the New York Yankees finishing third, Joe Nathan from the Texas Rangers in fourth and my fifth place vote goes to Tommy Wilhelmsen of the Seattle Mariners.

The Walter Johnson (Top Pitcher) award goes again this season to the Detroit Tigers Justin Verlander who pitched 238.1 innings in 33 starts and went 17-8 with an ERA of 2.64 and a 1.06 WHIP and a .217 batting average against to go with his 239 strikeouts. Tampa Bay Rays David Price was my runner-up by an eye lash, Price had a great season going 20-5 with a 2.56 ERA but I gave the nod to Verlander for innings pitched and strikeouts. My third place vote goes to the Seattle Mariners Felix Hernandez, fourth goes to Chris Sale of the Chicago White Sox and fifth goes to Jeff Weaver of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

The Stan Musial (Top Player) award goes to the American League’s first triple crown winner since 1967, the Detroit Tigers 3B Miguel Cabrera. This was a very tough choice over my runner-up, outfielder Mike Trout of the Angels but in the end I think Cabrera earned it because of his triple crown and because he volunteered to move to 3B to make room for the recently acquired Prince Fielder. Both players had amazing seasons but I had to go with Cabrera this year. My third place vote goes to the Texas Rangers 3B Adrian Beltre, Twins catcher Joe Mauer gets my fourth place vote and my fifth place vote went to the shortstop from the New York Yankees because he played in 159 games and led the league in hits, and at bats at the age of 38.

National League

The Connie Mack (Top Manager) award goes to the Washington Nationals skipper Davey Johnson who took over the manager reigns late in 2011 and took the Nats to their first division championship and 98 wins this past season. Previous to taking over the Nationals manager role in 2011, Johnson last manged the Los Angeles Dodgers back in 2000. My runner-up for NL skipper of the year goes to rookie manager Mike Matheny of the St. Louis Cardinals. In his first job as a manager the former catcher Matheny took his team to a wild card playoff spot and 88 victories after losing his best player (Albert Pujols) to free agency and losing one of his best pitchers (Chris Carpenter) for all but 3 games in 2012. The third place vote goes to the Cincinnati Reds skipper Dusty Baker for leading that team to a 97 win division winning season in his fifth year on the job.

The Willie Mays (Rookie of the Year) award goes to the Washington Nationals outfielder Bryce Harper. The Nationals rookie also started his big league career in late April after starting the season in AAA and hit .270 with 22 home runs, 59 RBI’s, scored 98 runs and stole 18 bases. My runner-up may surprise some people but I think catcher Wilin Rosario of the Colorado Rockies had a fantastic rookie season hitting .270 with 28 home runs, 67 runs scored and 71 RBI’s while playing in just 117 games with just 396 at bats. My third place vote goes to lefty Wade Miley of the Arizona Diamondbacks who was 16-11 in 29 starts and 194.2 innings with a 3.33 ERA and a 1.18 WHIP for a team that went 81-81. Fourth place goes to 1B Anthony Rizzo of the Chicago Cubs and my fifth place vote goes to 27 year-old rookie pitcher Lucas Harrell who won 11 games for the worst team in baseball, the Houston Astros who won a total of 55 games this year.

The Goose Gossage (Top Reliever) award easily goes to the 24 year-old Atlanta Braves closer Craig Kimbrel who had 42 saves in 45 opportunities and posted a 3-1 record with a 1.06 ERA and a 0.65 WHIP. In 62.2 innings Kimbrel struck out 116 batters allowing only 27 hits and 14 walks and allowed opposing hitters a .126 batting average. The man is a machine. My runner-up is Aroldis Chapman of the Cincinnati Reds who also had 42 saves and struck out 122 batters in 71.2 innings while posting a 1.51 ERA and a 0.81 WHIP. Hitters hit .141 against Chapman. Third place goes to Jason Motte of the St., Louis Cardinals, fourth goes to Jonathan Papelbon of the Philadelphia Phillies and my fifth place vote goes to Joel Hanrahan of the Pittsburgh Pirates.

The Walter Johnson (Top Pitcher) award is a tough call but I am going with the New York Mets knuckleballer R.A. Dickey as my choice. Dickey pitched a league leading 233.2 innings and struck out a league leading 230 batters. The 37-year-old Dickey was 20-6 with a 2.73 ERA with a 1.05 WHIP for a team that won a total of 74 games. My runner-up is Gio Gonzalez of the division winning Washington Nationals who was 21-8 with a 2.89 ERA and an amazing 0.4/9 home runs allowed. My third place vote goes to the Los Angeles Dodgers Clayton Kershaw, fourth place goes to the Atlanta Braves Craig Kimbrel and my fifth place vote is for Cincinnati Reds Johnny Cueto.

The Stan Musial (Top Player) award goes to Milwaukee Brewers outfielder Ryan Braun again this year. Yes, I know all about last years fiasco with Braun but what can I say, the man puts up the numbers and without him the Brewers are nothing. Look at the numbers, a league leading 41 home runs to go with a league leading 108 runs scored, second in RBI’s (112) and a .319 batting average. Top that off with 356 total bases and you have the best player in the NL this season. The runner-up this year is Pittsburgh Pirates outfielder Andrew McCutchen who had a wonderful season. My third place vote goes to San Francisco catcher and part-time first baseman Buster Posey. Posey almost single handedly led the Giants to the NL Western Division title and if he had played as well the entire year as he did in the second half of the season he might have been my choice to win this award. Posey hit .385 and knocked in 60 runs during the last half of 2012 coming off a horrific injury in 2011. I will go with New York Mets pitcher R.A. Dickey fourth in the voting here because without Dickey the Mets would have been not worth watching. Atlanta Braves closer Craig Kimbrel gets my fifth place vote.

So there you have it, the players that I think deserve to bring home the hardware after another great season of baseball in 2012. You may agree or disagree with my choices but that is what makes baseball such a great game and so much fun for us as fans to enjoy. When the BBA announces their winners in the near future I will share them with you.

Dozier and Liriano

Brian Dozier

Shortstop James Brian Dozier was called up from Rochester yesterday and made his major league debut against the Angels going 1 for 4 with a run scored. The soon to be 25 year-old (May 15) was drafted by the Twins in the 8th round of the June 2009 amateur draft and Dozier has a .305 batting average in 4 minor league seasons (345 games) and has not hit below .274 while playing 2B, SS, and 3B. It will be interesting to see if Dozier who only has 28 games of AAA experience can hold on to the shortstop role at Target Field. Dozier had a great spring and many fans thought that Dozier earned the Twins starting shortstop job in Fort Myers but GM Terry Ryan felt that Dozier needed some AAA seasoning. Although Jamey Carroll, 38 has played a decent shortstop so far this season, he is only hitting .212 and the team is off to a terrible start at 7-21 and some changes need to be made to see if anything can be done to salvage the season before the Twins go into a full sell mode and turn to a total rebuilding effort. Dozier is not going to turn the Twins around on his own but hopefully he can play a small role in getting the Twins moving.

Francisco Liriano

The Twins lost again last night and are now 7-21 for the season and 10 games behind the division leading Cleveland Indians. I sure didn’t think I would be saying “division leading Cleveland Indians” this season but the Detroit Tigers are struggling as they come out of the starting gate and they are playing just .500 ball but I think they will warm up soon and put the Indians and all the other AL Central teams in their rear view mirror. The Tigers have their share of pitching miseries but not like the cellar dwelling Twins do. The Twins sent Francisco Liriano out to the mound again last night and once again Liriano let the team and himself down. Liraino threw 90 pitches in 5 innings while giving up 5 hits, 3 walks and 4 earned runs and even with this line he actually lowered his seasonal ERA to 9.45. Liraino had one decent inning last night and other than that looked like the same old Liriano. I just don’t know how the Twins can continue to send Liriano out there every fifth day when he is pitching as bad as he is. Liriano brings down the entire team everytime he walks out to the mound. Gardenhire and pitching coach Rick Anderson have tried everything including skipping a start with Francisco but to no avail. After last nights game Gardy was quoted as saying, “what can we do, we just need to send him out there”. I for one have seen enough of Liraino this season in a starting role, it is time to move Liriano to the bullpen where he can have some chance of success albeit in a relief role. You have to do something, you can’t pay Liriano the kind of money he is getting and have him under perform as badly as he has todate. The team is 7-21 for pete’s sake, what have you got to lose? Send Liraiano to the bullpen now and move Brian Duensing back into the starting rotation. Duensing is no Warren Spahn but he has to be better than Liriano and you still have that lefty in the bullpen that you want. Maybe this is not the way to build Liriano’s confidence but you have 24 other players on the team that shouldn’t be punished every fifth day when you send Liriano out to the mound.

How Twins have fared on Opening Day

When the Minnesota Twins open the 2012 season in Baltimore on Friday, April 6 it will mark the 32nd time in 52 season openers that the team has opened their baseball season as road warriors. As a cold weather team, the Twins have only played the seasons first game at Met Stadium five times (63,65,66,71,81) and fifteen times at the Metrodome. In their short history at Target Field the Twins have never opened the season at home. The Twins have not charged out of the gate on a winning note over the years winning only won 24 and losing 27 season opening games. You can make a strong case that their first ever game as Minnesota Twins on April 11, 1961 in Yankee Stadium when Pedro Ramos shut out the New Yorks Yankees 6-0 on just 3 hits was their greatest season opener ever. The most frequest opening day opponent for the Twins has been the Oakland A’s. The Twins have played the Oakland A’s on opening day ten times (the last time in 1990), eight times in Oakland and twice at home (at the Met in 1981 and at the Metrodome in 1987) and the opening day series between these two teams is tied at five game each. The Twins have drawn the Seattle Mariners as opening day opponents four times, twice at home and twice on the road and the Twins have yet to beat the Mariners on opening day.

Pitcher Brad Radke has taken the mound for the Twins on opening day nine times including seven in a row between 1999 and 2005. Radke’s record on opening day was 4 wins, 2 losses, and 3 no decisions. Kent Hrbek has started 12 games at 1B on opening day, the most games that any Twins player has played at any position on opening day. A number of players have started opening day at their position nine times but Hrbek is still the leader in that category.

The Twins have opened the season in Baltimore only once before and that was back on April 11, 1967 in Memorial Stadium when Jim Kaat took the mound for the Twins but before he retired a single batter, the Orioles plated four runs and held on for a 6-3 win. The Twins only other season opener against the Baltimore Orioles occurred on April 2, 2007 at the Metrodome when the Twins behind starter Johan Sanatana and home runs from Torii Hunter and Justin Morneau won 7-4.

Here is who the Twins have faced and how they have fared on opening day.

TEAM WON LOST HOME AWAY YEARS
Yankees 2 2 2 2 61,65,88,89
Indians 2 1 2 1 63,64,04
Orioles 1 1 1 1 67,07
Royals 2 1 0 3 69,74,02
White Sox 1 1 1 1 70,93
Oakland A’s 5 5 2 8 72,73,77,79,80,81,86,87,90,91
Rangers 1 1 0 2 75,76
Mariners 0 4 2 2 78,82,05,09
Tigers 4 2 4 2 83,84,96,97,01,03
Red Sox 0 1 0 1 95
Blue Jays 1 3 1 3 98,99,06,11
Rays 0 1 1 0 00
LA Angels 1 1 1 1 08,10
Cal. Angels 1 1 1 1 85,94
Brewers 1 1 1 1 71,92
Senators 1 0 0 1 68
KC A’s 1 1 1 1 62,66
TOTALS 24 27 20 31

This Day in Twins History – February 20, 2001

 

William (Bill) Joseph Rigney, The Minnesota Twins fifth manager, passed away at the age of 83 in Walnut Creek, California on February 20, 2001.

After Bill Martin was fired as the Twins manager after only one season (1969), Bill Rigney managed the Twins from 1970-1972 and had a 208-184 won/lost record. The Twins finished in first place in Rigney’s first season as the Twins skipper in 1970 but they lost 3-0 to the Baltimore Orioles in the ALCS. This was the only title that Rigney won as a manager in his 18 year managing career. Rigney was fired 70 games in to the 1972 season and was replaced by Frank Quilici. Rigney also managed the New York Giants in 1956-1957, the San Francisco Giants in 1958-1960, the Los Angeles Angels from 1961-1964, the California Angels from 1965-1969 and finally he finished his MLB managing career with one more year at the helm of the San Francisco Giants in 1976. Rigney was the American League Manager of the year in 1962.

Bill Rigney, known as the Cricket or Specs, played in the big leagues for 8 seasons from 1946-1953 as a 2B, 3B, and shortstop for the New York Giants and was an All-Star in 1948 and played in the 1951 World Series when the Giants lost to the New York Yankees. Rigney had a little pop in his bat too as his 24 doubles and 17 home runs in 1947 indicate.

After his playing and managing career were over, Bill Rigney was a broadcaster for the San Francisco Giants and Oakland Athletics. He also scouted and was briefly in the front office for the Angels, Padres, and the A’s. Bill Rigney served his country in the US Coast Guard during World War II.

Make sure you check our Today in Twins History page daily to see what interesting things happened each and every day over the long and glorious history of the Minnesota Twins.