WORLD SERIES / MINNESOTA TWINS VS. ATLANTA BRAVES : NOTES : Kelly Bemoans Lack of DH for Games in Atlanta

The only shadow over what Minnesota Manager Tom Kelly called “the dream we all think about when we’re kids growing up” is that he can’t use the designated hitter in the World Series games in Atlanta.

Designated hitter Chili Davis led the Twins with 29 home runs and 93 runs batted in, but he will be relegated to the bench in Games 3, 4 and 5.

“Any time you take out 29 home runs and all those RBIs and you insert the pitcher, it’s not good,” Kelly said. “It’s like going from the invitational to the $3,000 claimer. That’s not good.

“We’re playing with 24 outs instead of 27, and I don’t see that it’s a disadvantage for the NL to have the DH. They’ll have (Steve) Avery hitting and I guess (John) Smoltz can swing the bat, but I’m sure they’d rather have (Brian) Hunter or (Keith) Mitchell or (Jeff) Treadway swing the bat instead of the pitchers. But this is the way it is. I just hope our pitchers don’t get hurt.”

With left-handers starting the first three games for the Braves, Twin third baseman Mike Pagliarulo--a left-handed hitter--will be sitting. But that is the least of his worries. His father, Charles, and his grandfather, Michael Anthony, are in remission from bladder cancer.

Charles Pagliarulo, 54, was in the building trade but lost his job when his first bout with kidney and lung cancer hospitalized him for six months in 1988. He and Michael Anthony Pagliarulo, 77, live in Medford, Mass., a suburb of Boston.

Pagliarulo said his father will attend World Series games in Atlanta next week but won’t be in Minneapolis because he couldn’t find someone to care for Pagliarulo’s 15-year-old sister Charneen, who has cerebral palsy.

Atlanta catcher Greg Olson, who played briefly for the Twins in 1989, bears no grudge against them for not re-signing him. He signed with the Braves as a free agent in November of that year.

“I knew they had Tim Laudner and Brian Harper, and after that year, my best opportunity was with Atlanta,” said Olson, who lives in the Twin Cities suburb of Edina. “Everything has worked out great.”

In the previous nine Series played on both artificial turf and grass, the turf team won has six times. . . . Atlanta’s Lonnie Smith will become the first to play in the World Series with four teams. Smith was with the 1980 Phillies, ’82 Cardinals and the ’85 Royals. . . . The Braves are the first team to represent three cities in the Series. The Boston Braves were in the Series in 1914 and ‘48, and the Milwaukee Braves made it in ’57 and ’58.

The Twins are looking forward to seeing Atlanta fans do the tomahawk chop.

“It’s good for baseball,” Minnesota pitcher Kevin Tapani said. “But I’ve got to think their arms have gotten tired after a seven-game (playoff) series.”