TONY OLIVA
Game 216 | January 23, 1973 | Tony Oliva, Ken Sanders
Missing all but 10 games of the 1972 season due to a series of knee operations, Tony Oliva was about to have his career reborn with the inception of the Designated Hitter role in the American League. He played four years as a DH for the Twins and came back to hit .291 with 16 home runs and 92 RBIs in 1993. Sanders, obtained in an off-season trade with Philadelphia for Cesar Tovar, won only two games and saved eight in his lone season with the Twins in 1973. Tovar played all nine positions for the Twins in a game in late 1968.
Game 632 | May 13, 2004 | Tony Oliva, Bert Blyleven, Jack Morris
This meeting focused on three former Twins who, despite outstanding major league statistics, had not been elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Oliva won batting titles in his first two seasons, finished with a career batting average of .304 and was the 1964 American League Player of the Year. Blyleven is fifth on the major league all-time strikeout list with 3,701. He won 287 major league games and threw 60 shutouts. Morris, the dominant American League pitcher in the 1980s with Detroit, won 254 games and was the winning pitcher for the Twins in the seventh game of the 1991 World Series.
Game 660 | August 19, 2005 | Tony Oliva, Jim Perry, Frank Quilici
The Minnesota Twins had a major promotion in August 2005 to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the 1965 team that won the American League title. Nearly 20 former players and coaches attended. Perry went 12-7 on the pitching staff. Oliva hit .321 to win his second straight American League batting title, and Quilici joined the team mid-season and fielded and hit well as a second baseman in the World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Game 959 | January 18, 2022 | Tony Oliva, Kris Atteberry
Just a month after learning he’d been elected to the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame, Tony shared his thoughts with Dunkers. He was a three-time American League batting champion, an 8-time All Star outfielder and the American League Rookie of the Year in 1964. He played his entire career with the Minnesota Twins.
(LtoR) Dan Stoltz, Tony Oliva, Dave St. Peter (physician), Kris Atteberry (moderator), Dave Mona
