The Twins’ spit and baling wire bullpen, a mix of veterans, rookies and major league castoffs, has been the Achilles’ heel of this team since the beginning of the season. And it continued Saturday after reliever Eric Orze could not protect a 2-1 lead in the 9th inning. He allowed two runs on two hits,... Continue Reading »

At the least the Twins could hit and score runs in 1996, but that was not the case in the strike-shortened season of 1995. They got their usual offensive support from the likes of Kirby Puckett, Chuck Knoblauch and Rookie of the Year Marty Cordova, but on the mound it was not pretty, despite the... Continue Reading »

As I noted in my previous post, the Twins, although they couldn’t pitch in 1996, they certainly could hit and score runs, racking up 877 of them by season’s end. Not only did they score a lot of runs, they also came in bunches, including on April 24 when the Twins scored a team record... Continue Reading »

The 1996 season looked pretty bleak for the Minnesota Twins. No Kevin Tapani, no Scott Erickson and most of all, no Kirby Puckett, who took a fastball to the face toward the end of the 1995 season and then found himself on the injured list as the new season began on April 1, 1996, at... Continue Reading »

You never know when you’re going to have an unsettling Minnesota Twins moment. As I mentioned in my previous post, I recently opened a 32-year-old pack of Topps baseball cards with a friend and immediately found a Kirby Puckett card, only then to discover that there were two cards stuck together. As I peeled them... Continue Reading »

The term “evil empire” used to be synonymous with the New York Yankees, but now the Bronx Bombers look absolutely tame and tepid alongside the Los Angeles Dodgers, a money-spending, player-hording, behemoth of a team that appears willing to hoover up any talent in sight to maintain their World Series-winning ways. The latest example? The... Continue Reading »

Two charter members of the American League — the Washington Senators and Chicago White Stockings (better known today as the Twins and White Sox) — met on Friday and the Twins emerged victorious in a nervy 9-7 win at Rate Field, which is a modest improvement over Guaranteed Rate Field. The Twins held an 8-4... Continue Reading »

The Twins improved (if one can say that) to 3-6 against the AL Central on Sunday after they topped the Detroit Tigers before 15,000 fans at Target Field. That’s an underwhelming attendance figure for a sunny Sunday, but with Hall of Famer Joe Mauer in the house and a new statue of him outside the... Continue Reading »

Might as well get on the bandwagon. If MLB.com can recall an incredible weekend turned in by Twins’ Hall of Famer Kirby Puckett, I can do the same, right? I also need something to write about and this fits the bill perfectly. During the weekend of Aug. 29-30, 1987, the Twins found themselves in Milwaukee... Continue Reading »