Word: melee
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Then I opened my bible, the Record-American yesterday, and I couldn't believe my eyes. Minnesota manager Sam Mele apparently switched around his entire pitching rotation. After Mudcat Grant (21-7) starts the first game, he'll go all the way with lefthanders. That means Jim Kaat (18-11) pitches the second game and, instead of Camilo Pascual, Jim Merritt (5-4 since coming up from Deaver in July) may go in the third...
Minnesota Twins Manager Sam Mele felt pretty much like that great Peanuts Pitcher-Manager Charlie Brown after a hard day on the mound. Outfielder Bob Allison was playing with a hairline fracture of the right wrist. Outfielder Tony Oliva was nursing a chipped knuckle in his right hand. Catcher Earl Battey had a strained back. Worse still, Ace Pitcher Camilo Pascual had to go to the hospital for surgery on torn muscles in his right arm pit. And then, last week -good grief! First Baseman Harmon Killebrew, Mele's star player-he is tied for the league lead...
What effect have all those injuries had on the Twins? So far, almost none. Substitutes have played like regulars; the Twins have won ten of their last twelve games, and at week's end were still leading the league. Says Manager Mele proudly: "No club in the history of baseball, not even the champion Yankees of two years ago, when both Mantle and Maris were injured, have experienced the hardships the Twins have fought through this season. But each day a different guy picks us up. I hope and expect it will continue...
More On the Ball. In Manager Sam Mele's opinion, the Twins' greatest improvement came where it was needed most: on the mound. Under the coaching of Curve Baller John Sain, formerly with the Boston Braves, the Twins' pitchers have performed remarkably well: Jim Perry, with a new breaking curve in his repertoire, has six wins, no losses; Jim "Mudcat" Grant has won nine games and lost three; Camilo Pascual's record is 8-2. There is some notable talent in Mele's bullpen, too. "Last year we'd go into the late innings...
...Mele's new faces, he still builds his attack around an oldtimer, Harmon Killebrew, 29, a ham-armed slugger who has hit 288 home runs and is closing in on Babe Ruth's home-run rate: Ruth ticked off a homer for every 11.8 times at bat; Killebrew is rapping one for every 12.9. Moreover, Killebrew gets his homers when they are most needed. In the last inning of the recent series against the Yankees, the Twins were trailing 5-4; with two men out, one man on, and the count at 3-2, Killebrew pounded Pete Mikkelsen...