Minnesota Twins Daily Morning Dip: Coomer’s Big Dip
Minnesota Twins Daily Dip, November 18th, 2017
Welcome to the November 18th edition of the Daily Dip, your daily piece of news and notes here on Puckett’s Pond, offseason edition. You’ll find the most recent news of the Minnesota Twins organization, stories from around the game, and links to any information you may want to know about the Minnesota Twins or baseball as we work our way through the hot stove season!
Minnesota Twins Scores, News and Notes
Australian Baseball League Update
The ABL kicked off on Thursday. Aaron Whitefield is playing in his home country with the Brisbane Bandits. In the first game of the season, the Bandits played the Canberra Cavalry and used a 4-run 7th inning to win 8-5 in the season opener. Whitefield went 3-5 with 2 runs and a double.
On Friday, Brisbane again played Canberra, getting down early, but powering back to win 5-4. Whitefield went 1-3 with a double, a run, a walk, and a strikeout in the game.
Also on Friday, the Perth Heat defeated the Melbourne Aces 9-1. Former Twin Luke Hughes was the driving force behind the Heat offense, going 3-4 with two home runs and 5 RBI. Former Twin Delmon Young started for Melbourne at DH, going 0-4 with a strikeout. Former Twin Mark Hamburger started the game for the Aces, going 6 innings, allowing 6 runs on 10 hits and 4 walks, striking out 9.
More from Puckett's Pond
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- Minnesota Twins: What happens next at Shortstop?
- Minnesota Twins: Grading the Twins’ Joey Gallo signing
- Minnesota Twins: 4 Possible Trade Chips not named Kepler or Arraez
- Minnesota Twins: After missing out on Correa, what comes next?
Twins radio to return to WCCO
After a couple years away, the Minnesota Twins will return their broadcasts to WCCO this coming season. WCCO was the Twins’ radio broadcast home for the first 46 years of the franchise, until 2006.
Twins get competitive balance pick
An important part of the offseason planning came into place for the Twins. With the new qualifying offer system, the Twins would only give up their 3rd pick in the draft, which will be the pick they were awarded Thursday, the #75 overall selection in the draft.
Dozier 11th, Buxton 18th in AL MVP voting
Jose Altuve ran away with the award, but Brian Dozier and Byron Buxton each got support in the American League MVP voting.
Notes from around baseball
- Astros dominate Esurance MLB awards
- Arizona Fall League championship on Saturday
- Bradley, Jr. and daughter enjoying the offseason
- Stanton future uncertain after MVP
- Ohtani an elite arm, but his bat could also be valuable
- Favorite MLB Thanksgiving recipes
- Yankees interview Boone for manager
Next: Twins Free Agent Pitcher Options
One Last Thing
Today’s birthday to celebrate is Ron Coomer, turning 51. Coomer came to the Twins as his fourth team of his career. The Oakland Athletics originally drafted Coomer in the 14th round of the 1987 draft, and he was part of the A’s system until 1990, when he was released. The White Sox picked him up the next spring and had him until 1993, when he was traded to the Dodgers. The Dodgers then traded Coomer to the Twins in 1995 as part of the deal that sent Kevin Tapani and Mark Guthrie to Los Angeles.
Coomer’s most notorious year was 1999, when he opened the season on a tear and earned an All-Star nod. I was at the game where Coomer entered the game leading the American League in hitting with a .354 mark on May 21st, a game against the Oakland Athletics. That game went 15 innings, finishing with a 2-1 walk-off Twins win, but in the game, Coomer went 0-7, dropping him all the way to .336. By the end of the season, he’d dropped all the way down to .263.