TWINS TRIVIA is hopefully a fun and informative site that will help you to better enjoy the Minnesota Twins and their wonderful history. “History never looks like history when you are living through it” – John Gardner, former Secretary of Health
What is dWAR? Defensive WAR (dWAR): this takes only the player’s defensive contributions and positional adjustment into account in a WAR calculation. dWAR was created by Baseball-Reference. I am using this tool to look at Minnesota Twins players from 1961 thru 2023 to see what it determines as the best defensive Twins players by position for their entire Twins career. A player has to have played at least 51% of his games at that position to qualify. According to dWAR, Greg Gagne is the best defensive player the Twins have ever had.
Minnesota Twins Greg Gagne (7) in action, 6/16/1991 CREDIT: Chuck Solomon (Photo by Chuck Solomon /Getty Images
Josh Donaldson while with the Atlanta Braves in 2019. Mandatory Credit: Brett Davis-USA TODAY Sports
I was watching the MLB channel last night when they interrupted their programming with breaking news that the Boston Red Sox and manager Alex Cora had mutually agreed to part ways after the previous days bombshell of the “caught stealing” penalties dropped on the Houston Astros by MLB. Then just a few minutes into that, they had more breaking news, this time the report was that a source (turned out to be MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand) had reported that third baseman Josh Donaldson had agreed to accept a four-year deal with Minnesota for $92 million guaranteed, including an $8 million buyout of a $16 million club option for a fifth year.
Welcome to our second decade of Twins Turkey of the year awards. I sure hope you are all enjoying the snow that we were blessed with over the last few days as you made your way to enjoy Thanksgiving with your loved ones. Let’s get right down to business of naming this years Twins Turkey of the Year.
We all know that strikeout rates are up all across baseball for the last few years but today we will look at Minnesota Twins batters and their strikeout rates going back to 1961. We used B-R’s amazing Play Index to find what we were looking for.
The top two all time Twins leader in strikeouts are Harmon Killebrew with 1,314 and Joe Mauer with 1,034. Mauer? What the heck? Longevity can do strange things to numbers and the devil is in the details.
The Minnesota Twins have a long history of problems developing starting pitching. Using 100 starts as a barometer, since 1961 the Twins have signed and developed just 11 pitchers in their system that have gone on to get 100 or more starts in a Twins uniform. The only first round pick in the bunch is Pete Redfern, three round tw0 picks, two round three picks, one fourth round pick, one fifth round pick, Brad Radke was an eighth round pick, one 29th round pick and an amateur free agent (Dave Boswell).
Since the June amateur free agent draft started in 1965 the Twins have drafted 31 pitchers in round 1 or as round 1 supplementary/compensation picks. Actually part of the Twins issues with starting pitching relates to spending money or the lack there of. The first two right-handed pitchers drafted by the Twins in round 1 were Dick Ruthven in 1972 and Tim Belcher (first overall pick) in 1983 who both refused to sign with Minnesota and went on to have long careers in MLB. The first left-handed pitcher drafted in round 1 to start any games was Eddie Bane and his Twins career lasted 25 starts. As I mentioned earlier, the draft started in 1965 but the Twins only drafted starting pitching in round 1 twice (Ruthven in 1972 and Bane in 1973) between 1965-1981. The first RHP that they drafted in round 1 that actually started a number of games (45 in Twins career) was Willie Banks who the team drafted in 1987. Since 2000 they have drafted a pitcher in round 1 a total of 17 times.
Starting pitching signed and developed by the Twins since 1961
If you can’t find, sign, and develop your starting pitching, you only have a few options at your disposal, you could make a trade, you can sign a free agent, or you can find one on the waiver wire (ha, ha, ha).
The option I want to write about here is the Twins attempts to trade for starting pitching since the turn of the century, a total of 17 years. Trading for starters hasn’t exactly gone as planned either.
One of the more frequent questions I get pertains to switch-hitters that played for the Minnesota Twins so I thought I would put together the entire list of Twins players both position players and pitchers that swung from both sides of the plate. In this case I ranked then in order of home runs hit. The list includes Twins pitchers as well as position players.
You can make a strong case that Mickey Mantle was the best switch-hitter in the AL as he hit .300 (with 500 or more PA’s) or more nine time and Victor Martinez who remains active today has hit. 300 eight times as has Bernie Williams. Roberto Alomar did it seven times.
The Twins have not had as much luck with their switch-hitters, the only Twin to hit .300 (.302) or better with at least 500 plate appearances was Cristian Guzman in 2001. It kind of makes you wonder if switch hitting is worth the effort. From 1901 to 1960 the Washington Senators never had a switch-hitter that hit .300 or better with at least 500 PA’s.
Strikeouts are up all across baseball the last few years so I thought it would be fun to see who the Minnesota Twins “King of the Whiff” is from 2000-2015. No real shockers on this list but I was a bit surprised to see Joe Mauer so high on the list even though he once had a reputation as a tough guy to strike out.
If you go all the way back to the Twins start in 1961 you will see that Hall of Famer Harmon Killebrew holds the Twins all-time strike out title with 1,314 whiffs and that equates to striking out once in every 6.10 plate appearances. However, the recently retired Hunter struck out once every 5.60 plate appearances if you look at his entire Twins career. At the rate Joe Mauer is striking out, he could replace Hunter as the 2000 to current Twins King of the Whiff this season.
During this same time period Adam Dunn went down swinging a total of 2,379 times or once every 3.50 PA’s. That’s 2,379 KO’s and 1,631 hits on the resume.
The Twins 25 man roster appears to be set and Chris Herrmann is the back-up catcher. How does that happen? There is probably no nicer guy that Chris Herrmann but what is he doing making the Minnesota Twins 25 man roster going into the season opener just a few days away.
I need some help understanding how this could have happened. I know that the back-up catcher is not going to make or break the team in 2015 but I would like to understand the logic in this move. Nobody owes me an explanation, I understand that, but this move just seems like one of the dumbest moves the Twins have made in some time. I used to wonder if Nick Punto had some dirt on then manager Ron Gardenhire but now I have to wonder what Herrmann has on Paul Molitor and Terry Ryan. The other candidates for this role on the team were Josmil Pinto and Eric Fryer.
Eric Fryer is the oldest at 29 and he is primarily a catcher although Baseball-Reference lists him as a catcher/outfielder. That is kind of bogus as Fryer has appeared in just two games in the outfield for the Pittsburgh Pirates back in 2012 and the Twins have not used him as anything but a catcher. The case can be made that Fryer is the best catcher of the trio of candidates and he can hit a bit (career .246 average) but with little to no power. If the Twins brain trust were interested in just having a good back-stop then Fryer was their guy.
Josmil Pinto is already 26 and is by far the best hitter of the trio but pretty much everyone agrees that his work behind the plate still needs improvement, then again what players name could you bring up that doesn’t need improvement in some phase of his game. Pinto has a career average of .257 but he also has 11 home runs in just 78 games. Pinto has had injury issues this spring and that set him back for sure but unless the man is not in good enough shape to play, he should have been on the Twins roster.
The 27-year-old Chris Herrmann is a catcher by trade but the Twins also use him in the outfield and at first base. Herrmann has the most big league experience of this group having played in 97 games but his career average is .196 with four home runs. Herrmann’s is neither a good hitter nor a great defensive catcher but he brings flexibility to the table. But I have to ask you this, what good is flexibility in your back-up catcher when you carry only two catchers? The idea is that he is your back-up catcher, he is not going to play outfield or first base. The Twins have first base and the outfield covered, do you use him as the DH? Why? You have plenty of players that can be the DH that can hit better than Herrmann. There is ZERO logic in having Herrmann be the back-up catcher on this team.
I know that in a couple of weeks that Herrmann will be in Rochester and Pinto will be in Minnesota barring some kind of injury to Pinto but it drives me crazy when the Twins make cockamamy moves like this. I understand that this ballclub has far more serious issues than who the back-up catcher will be but this moves just jumps out at me and screams WHY? If you know why, tell me because I need help here.
As 2014 is coming to an end it is a good time to look back on another Twins season, their fourth in a row without post season play. But you have to be a winner to make post season play and the Twins have been anything but a winner the last few years. It has been a toss-up when you try to determine who has been more inept, the Twins players on the field or the ownership and Twins executives that sit behind their desks and make the decisions that determine the experience that Twins fans will have to live with during the up-coming season.
The Twins have had many losing seasons over the years and the real core Twins fans complained but they accepted the team they had and they looked forward to the next season with renewed hope for more wins “next year”. But it is seems different now, I am not sure why, maybe the fans are more passionate, maybe it is social media that allows Twins fans to better express their frustrations but today’s Twins fans are just plain mad and disgusted with the caliber of play their home team has displayed since the 2010 ended. Hopefully the Minnesota Twins organization feels some of the passion that Twins fans have and will start to look at the product from the fans perspective and see what they can do to make the fans experience a little more fun and and not so tough on the wallet.
Since the Washington Senators moved to Minnesota after the 1960 season and became the Minnesota Twins the team has played 8,617 regular season games, winning 4,274, losing 4,335 and playing to a tie on eight occasions in 54 seasons of play. Boy, how time flies by, I still remember that 1961 season.
Looking back at Twins history they have two World Series winners and a third World Series appearance in which they lost game seven to Sandy Koufax and the Los Angeles Dodgers. In addition to the 8,617 regular season games the team has played a total of 64 post season games winning 25 and losing 39. Their last post season appearance was in 2010 and that brief playoff run lasted just three games when they were swept by the New York Yankees 3 games to zip. The teams last post season win was back in 2004 (if I am not mistaken that is about 10 years ago, YIKES!) when they beat the Yankees in game 1 of the ALDS series before losing the next three games.
So let’s take a look at the hitting and pitching statistics of the Minnesota Twins in post season play. Let’s see who stood out under the bright lights of post season play and who couldn’t or didn’t deliver when the pressure was on. The names you will see below will bring back many memories, some good, some bad, some sad and in some cases you will say “who in the hell is so and so, I don’t remember him”. But it is fun looking back.
Since the Twins started play in 1961 through the 2014 season a total of 751 players have put on a Minnesota Twins uniform and appeared in a game either as a hitter or a pitcher. Only 162 of them or 21.57% have appeared in a Twins post season game over the 54 seasons the Twins have called Minnesota home.
Hitting challenged center fielder Aaron Hicks had a game winning hit a week or so ago at Target Field and since that day he is hitting at a .333 clip. Yes, I know that only encompasses 6 games and 22 plate appearances but it is a start. As hard as it may be to watch this 24 struggle with the bat, it is way too early to give up on the athletic outfielder. I hope the Twins keep working with Hicks and let him become the player he can be.
According to the Baseball Glossary a player batting between .100 and .199 is said to be “on the interstate.” The term refers to the fact that a batting average in the .100s can resemble an interstate name (e.g. .195 resembles I-95), especially on older scoreboards where the numeral “1” appears identical to the uppercase letter “I” . A hit to put an average above .200 gets a batter “off the interstate.” A batter whose average is below .100 is sometimes said to be “off the map”. The “Mendoza Line” is another baseball term coined after former shortstop Mario Mendoza, whose batting average is taken to define the threshold of incompetent hitting. That being said, this former Pirate, Mariner and Ranger shortstop managed to stay in the big leagues for all or parts of nine seasons and appear in 686 games. The cutoff point is most often said to be .200 and when a position player’s batting average falls below that level, the player is said to be “below the Mendoza Line”. This is often thought of as the offensive threshold below which a player’s presence in the big leagues cannot be justified, regardless of his defensive abilities.
Since the Washington Senators moved to Minnesota and became the Minnesota Twins in 1961 they have had a total of 373 position players. So how many of these players have had at least 300 at bats in a Twins uniform and not gotten off the interstate? Let’s take a look.
Current Twins outfielder/1B Chris Colabello in spite of a hot April is on the verge of joining this illustrious list by hitting .213 in 310 at bats and former shortstop Pedro Florimon who is now calling Rochester home has a Twins career mark of .208 in 605 at bats.
For all you Nick Punto bashers out there, he is no where close to making this list. In 1,121 career games spanning 14 seasons Punto is has a .247 career batting average.
UPDATE AS OF MAY 26, 2014 – Aaron Hicks announced today that he is done with switch-hitting and will only bat from the right side going forward. The Twins with no other center field options available have given him their blessing.
