All Metrodome Team
FSN has been running a promo or something related to an all Metrodome team. This would be comprised of players who played for the Twins while they were in the dome. Bert Blyleven, for example, technically would be eligible, but his best Twins years were pre-1982. So, I will unveil the unofficial firegardy.com Metrodome team. Note: nowhere will you find Nick Punto or Michael Cuddyer. Just sayin.
Starting Pitchers (I’m going to pick three): Johan Santana, Frank Viola, Scott Erickson. The first two are obvious choices as they won CY Young awards with the Twins, and were both pretty dominant. I picked Erickson because he was instrumental in the 91 World Series, he threw a no-hitter at the dome, and sported a sweet mullet.
Catcher: Joe Mauer. He is probably the best catcher the Twins have ever had. He only has played a few years in the Dome, and some might think Brian Harper is a better choice since he won a World Series. Mauer has two batting titles, finished pretty high in MVP voting, has a Gold Glove, and is still only 26.
First Base: Gotta go with Hrbek here. Two championships, and a pretty solid career top to bottom. Good defender at first, great hitter. His career average is 282, his career OPS+ is 128. All very good.
Second Base: Chuck Knoblauch. Rookie of the year, gold glove caliber secondbase (before we traded him), excellent leadoff man. He provided a great spark for that 91 team. Too bad every Twins team he was on sucked, outside of 91 of course.
Thirdbase: Gary Gaetti. The Rat provided power at the hot corner that the Twins have yet to replicate. He had back to back 30 homer years in 86 and 87. One of only two Dome era Twins players to do that, Justin Morneau being the other.
Shortstop: Greg Gagne. While not an huge offensive threat (what shortstop was in this era, Ripken maybe) Gagne was on both World Series teams. He also hit two inside the park homers in one game at the dome in 1986. So that’s cool. Gagne left the team on bad terms in 92 when we paid Puckett a huge contract and were unable to afford what Gagne thought he was worth. Oh well, he was a great shortstop to have when we had him.
Outfield: Kirby Puckett, Torii Hunter, Dan Gladden. This is a tougher one. The first two are obvious. For the third you could make a case for several players, including Tom Brunansky, or Shane Mack. As usual, the mullet is the tie-breaker.
Bullpen: (I’m going with two) Rick Aguilera and Jeff Reardon. These are two pretty obvious choices as they were the closers for the 91 and 87 teams. Reardon only played for the Twins for three years, but in those years he had save totals of 31-42-31. He had an ERA+ of 164 in 1988, that is very good. Aguilera stepped in to replace Reardon and the bullpen didn’t skip a beat. His ERA+ of 182 in 1991 basically meant if we got to the ninth, we were going to win. From 1990-94 he had save totals of: 32-42-41-34-23. He was then traded to Boston midway through 1995. But came back in 1996 with moderate success. Those teams were pretty bad so it is hard to expect much out of a closer on a terrible team.
I’m going to forego bench players.
As you may have noticed there are a lot of players from good Twins teams. When the Twins were bad, they obviously didn’t have many good players. I WANTED to pick Scott Stahoviak and Ron Coomer, but I just couldn’t.
What is your “All Dome Team”?
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Actually there is a place to vote for the all Metrodome team at the mlb.com page of the Twins.
Mine looks similar to yours with the following exceptions: Blyleven instead of Erickson, Shane Mack instead of Gladden, Nathan instead of Reardon and Chili Davis at DH
Can you vote for guys who didn’t get good until after they left the Twins? Because … David Ortiz for DH.
Also … I think Nathan has to be on the team, but it’d be tough to put him over either Reardon or Aguilera.
I thought about picking a DH and it was either going to be Davis or Molitor. I didn’t realize there was a formal vote. I like this better because you aren’t limited to a handful of players at each position.
I just checked it out. They did a good job of including all viable options at each position, except Scott Stahoviak. Brad Radke is another one I would consider for starting pitcher. or Tappani.
Radke and Tapani are both good options, but are definitely behind Santana, Viola, and Blyleven, and are probably behind Morris and Erickson.
If we were going to pick a 5 man rotation i would go with: Santana, Viola, Erickson, Radke, Tapani. Bert is great but like I said I think his best Twins years were pre-dome. We got Morris for one year. One great year, but still one year.
Fair enough.
I submit Justin Morneau for DH. I can’t argue against Hrbek, but there has to be a place for Justin on the All-Metrodome team.
I don’t think Morneau qualifies as a DH (he’s played DH for us fewer times than David Ortiz, and not that many more than … Jason Tyner).
Secondly, I don’t know if Morneau has really been around long enough or done enough to establish himself on the level of Kent Hrbek; he’ll be around for years, though, and WILL have the opportunity. I just wouldn’t say he’s there yet.
And given the way Morneau talks about wanting to reach the level of Hrbek and Killebrew, my guess is that he doesn’t think he’s their equal yet either.
There are no wrong answers in firegardy.com land. Except when I say so. Which is pretty much anything along the lines of “Cuddyer is way better than Delmon young”. I almost fought a girl over that statement, so tread lightly.
So if I start a “Cuddyer for third outfielder!” movement, you won’t be onboard?
I just think there should be a place for a perennial MVP candidate. If you’re not interested in having a bench, I put Morneau at DH.
If I chose a DH it would be a tough choice between a lot of guys: Morneau, Davis, and Molitor. Don Baylor was important, but wasn’t around very long.
Molitor’s always been a big name in the Twin Cities, and everyone has good memories of him. But he was only with the Twins for 3 years (and if that’s enough, then Morneau’s got him locked up).
Also … it was the tail end of his career. For the Twins, he only hit .312/.362/.432, which yielded him a 103 OPS+.
I’d really hope we can come up with an all-time DH with a better OPS+ than 103.
(This assumes, of course, that we’re taking his time with the Twins and not his whole career, as we are for Baylor, Blyleven, Morris, etc.)
Davis had a 135 OPS+ with the Twins … but only played for us for 2 seasons. (Really? I thought it was more. But what do I know, I was like 6 years old. Baseball-Reference says it was 2 years.)
I … can’t think of anyone else, actually, who would be a better choice for DH than Morneau. (I mean, assuming Morneau works as a DH and not solely as a 1B.)
Is it possible that in a couple of years Jason Kubel will be far and away the most successful Twins DH since … well, ever?
The reason I would say Davis might be best is because even though it wasn’t a long time, he was very valuable. So Morris could get votes too, based on that criteria.
I actually thought of Kubel when listing my DH candidates, Kubel has to be top 5 Twins DHs of all time. Maybe top 3. Its tought since the Twins haven’t really had an everyday DH. Just a guy who DHs to get a day off in the field or something. Jayson Tyner probably led the Twins in DH ABs in 2006 and 2007. Unacceptable. I’m glad we now have a guy whose name we can write in (semi)permanent ink next to “DH”.
“Morris could get votes based on that criteria”
As a pitcher, obviously not as a DH. Although I’d vote for Morris over Tyner as a DH
Haha, if Morris is eligible in the DH conversation, then so is EVERYONE.
The top two DHs probably are Davis and Molitor, despite the fact that they weren’t with us long (and Molitor wasn’t very effective).
If Kubel has a good year, he’s right up there, maybe third. I think he needs to have a good year before he gets the big ranking, even though there’s really nobody to put ahead of him even now.
Gardy finally realized that this is the AL, and DH is an actual position, and not just for guys who are “resting” or “hit about as well as a pitcher.”
I wont go into my All-Dome team, as you guys have pretty much hashed out every person possible to be on it already, I’d have to agree with the ones who made and the ones who are “close” to making it…
I do have a short story though, since you mentioned Scott Erickson and his no-hitter… My eldest brother was supposed to be in attendance at that very game back in ‘94… Our high school had a program for seniors called Jr. Bank Board and every spring they would bring everyone down to the cities to visit the Grain Exchange, a few banks downtown and then head to a Twins games that night… on this particular trip, the bus broke down on the way (4.5 hr trip from NoDak) so they finally had the bus fixed and made it to the cities and to the hotel, where they then found out what happened at the “game” that night! They of course were “shocked” and in “awe” with disappointment.. and to this day whenever it’s mentioned or he sees the picture in the Dome, he just cringes and most likely swears under his breath at himself… yeah… SUCK.
Man that sucks.
It’s really a shame that a crappy bus destroyed the stadium for him and a bunch of his contemporaries.
They were really in for a treat that night.