Tag: Yogi Berra

Should the Twins President, GM and Manager keep their jobs?

When the Minnesota Twins hired Hall of Famer Paul Molitor to manage the Twins starting with the 2015 season they had to know that they were swimming up-stream and that the baseball gods were against them. The list of “modern” MLB Hall of Fame players that tried their luck as managers is relatively short and none of them have turned out to be Hall of Fame managers.

Frank Robinson

Robinson, Frank ExposFrank Robinson may have been the best of the skippers that had Hall of Fame on his resume. Robinson managed four different teams (Indians, Giants, Orioles, Expos/Nationals) over 16 seasons from 1975-2006. Robinson took over the Orioles manager duties in 1988 after they had an 0-6 record and he managed them to 15 more consecutive losses before they won their first game of the season after an 0-21 start. The next season (1989) Frank Robinson was selected as the AL Manager of the year after leading his team to a second place finish and a 87-75 record. Although he may have been the best manager of the Hall of Fame group, he finished his managing career with zero playoff appearances. His career mark as a manager was 1,065-1,176 (.475).

Yogi Berra

Yogi Berra managed for all or parts of five season with two New York clubs, the Yankees and the Mets. Although his career managing record was 484-444, he did take both the Mets and Yankees to a pennant.

Bob Lemon

Bob Lemon managed for all or parts of eight seasons between 1970-1982 and had a lifetime managing record of 430 and 403 with the Royals, White Sox  and Yankees. He does have two pennants and a World Series championship on his resume but in both of these cases he took over the job during the season and never managed a team to a pennant from start to finish.

Ted Williams

Ted Williams managed the Washington Senators from 1969 through 1972 when he called it quits. He led the Senators to a 86-76 record in his first season (1969) as the Senators skipper but in 1970 his team was 70-92, in 1971 the team was 63-96, and in 1972 he was 54-100. Do you see a trend here? His career mark as a manager was 273-364 (.429) and zero play-off appearances.

Ryne Sandberg

Ryne Sandberg took over as skipper of the Phillies 44 games into the 2013 season and left after a 26-48 start to the 2015 season. Sandberg had a 119-159 mark as a skipper during his Phillies tenure.

Paul Molitor

Paul Molitor
Paul Molitor

Paul Molitor was hired to be the Twins manager prior to the 2015 season and todate his record as a manager stands at 94-113 (.454). Molitor took over a team that had not won more games than it lost since 2010 and in 2015 he led them to a 83-79 record. At first glance does not seem that bad over all, but, there is always that but.  In May of 2015 the Twins were 20-7, if you subtract that month Molitor managed the team to a 63-72 record. This year Molitor’s record is 15-35, the team is playing at a lousy .300 winning percentage but even that starts to look good when you look at their road record of 7-20 (.259). You want to see more? The Twins are 0-6 against the White Sox, 0-6 against the Tigers, and 1-5 against the Royals but on the positive side they are 4-2 against the Indians. A record of 5-19 in your own division does not cut it, it is totally unacceptable even if you are playing just for fun and the Twins are certainly not playing for the fun of it.

Continue reading Should the Twins President, GM and Manager keep their jobs?

According to Elias and a little extra

Zelous Wheeler, called up from the minors by the Yankees on Thursday when slumping Yangervis Solarte was sent down, made a big splash in his major-league debut when he hit a home run in the fifth inning against the Twins’ Phil Hughes. Wheeler is the eighth player to hit a home run for the Yankees is his first major-league game and the first since Marcus Thames in 2002. The most notable player to homer for the Yankees in his big-league debut is Yogi Berra, who did so against the Philadelphia A’s in the first game of a doubleheader in the Bronx on Sept. 22, 1946.

So how many Minnesota Twins players have hit a home run in their first game?

Rick Renick
Rick Renick
Rk Player Year ? PA AB H 2B 3B HR RBI
1 Luke Hughes 2010 Ind. Games 4 4 1 0 0 1 1
2 Andre David 1984 Ind. Games 4 4 1 0 0 1 2
3 Gary Gaetti 1981 Ind. Games 3 3 1 0 0 1 2
4 Kent Hrbek 1981 Ind. Games 5 5 2 0 0 1 2
5 Tim Laudner 1981 Ind. Games 4 3 2 0 0 1 2
6 Dave McKay 1975 Ind. Games 3 3 1 0 0 1 1
7 Eric Soderholm 1971 Ind. Games 4 2 1 0 0 1 1
8 Hal Haydel 1970 Ind. Games 3 3 2 1 0 1 1
9 Rick Renick 1968 Ind. Games 4 4 1 0 0 1 1
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 7/4/2014.

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How about if we look to see who has hit a home run in his first game when the opponent was the Minnesota Twins?

Rk Player Year ? PA AB H 2B 3B HR RBI Tm
1 Zelous Wheeler 2014 Ind. Games 4 4 2 0 0 1 1 NYY
2 Chris Richard 2000 Ind. Games 5 4 1 0 0 1 1 STL
3 Jay Bell 1986 Ind. Games 3 3 1 0 0 1 1 CLE
4 Dave Machemer 1978 Ind. Games 4 4 1 0 0 1 1 CAL
5 Bert Campaneris 1964 Ind. Games 5 4 3 0 0 2 3 KCA
6 John Kennedy 1962 Ind. Games 1 1 1 0 0 1 1 WSA
Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 7/4/2014.

According to Elias

Oswaldo Arcia
Oswaldo Arcia

Oswaldo Arcia celebrated his 22nd birthday with a home run and a triple, helping the Twins defeat the Red Sox in Boston, 5-3. Arcia joined Yogi Berra as the youngest players to homer at Fenway Park on their birthdays. Berra did so at age 22 in 1947, in a game the Yankees lost, 4-3, when Boston scored three runs in the bottom of the eighth inning to overcome a 3-1 deficit. Ted Williams is next on that list; he marked his 23rd birthday with a home run at Fenway against the Philadelphia Athletics in 1941.

Twins sign Sean Burroughs and Rene Rivera

Rene Rivera

The Twins announced that they have signed free agents 3B Sean Burroughs and catcher Rene Rivera to minor league deals and gave both spring training invites. Rene Rivera is someone we are all familiar with as he was with the Twins this past season as part of the catching group that tried to cover the games that Joe Mauer was not able to play. Rivera played in 35 games and had 15 hits in 104 at bats giving him a .144 batting average. Rivera is only in camp because there are lots of pitchers that need to be caught and he has zero chance of making the Twins team in 2012 unless of course Joe Mauer and Ryan Doumit coming up missing between now and February.

Sean Burroughs

The signing of 3B Sean Burroughs, 31,  is kind of interesting and his baseball career has had some twists and turns. Let’s us go back to the beginning, Sean is the son of former 1974 AL MVP Jeff Burroughs and he was the star of the Long Beach Little league team that won back-to-back world championships in 1992 and 1993 with his Dad as the coach. Sean was selected 9th overall in 1998 by the San Diego Padres out of high school. San Diego was able to convince Burroughs to forego a scholarship to USC and sign with the club. When the Padres completed spring training in 2002, Sean Burroughs was their starting 3B. Although Burroughs hit for average he did not display the kind of power hat everyone usually expects out of the 3B position. After 4 years in San Diego Burroughs had hit just 11 home runs. After the 2005 season Burroughs was traded to Tampa Bay but they released him in August of 2006. Burroughs then signed on with the Seattle Mariners but he never made the big league club and by June he was released and out of baseball. Substance abuse was taking its toll on Sean Burroughs and he found himself in Las Vegas staying in the cheapest hotels he could find and now and then having to eat out of garbage cans. Luckily, Burroughs was able to straighten out his life, regain sobriety and sign a contract with the Arizona D-Backs in November in 2010 and by May 19, 2011 a little over 5 years since his last big league at bat, Sean Burroughs was back playing major league baseball.

Burroughs is a left-handed hitter and stand 6’2″ and goes about 180 lbs. It would be nice to see Sean Burroughs continue to rise from the depths of desperation by becoming an All-Star player in Minnesota but we need to be realistic here. The man is 31 years old and was out of baseball for over 5 years before signing with Arizona last season. The Twins have signed Burroughs to push Danny Valencia a bit and if worse comes to worse, Burroughs might be the guy that the Twins can plug in at 3B for a time. Sure, nuggets are sometimes found but more often than not, there are reasons why players like Burroughs are not stars. But it is fun to wish and to hope, particularly during the holiday season but I think we have to look at Burroughs as insurance, we all hate to pay for insurance but we all need to have it because you never know when you will need. Didn’t Yogi Berra say that? You can’t help but root for someone who is working to get his life back and I wish him the best and if he can help the Twins, so much the better.