BASEBALL DAILY REPORT : WORLD SERIES : Former Twin Owner Views From Afar

Calvin Griffith, 79, former owner of the Minnesota Twins, is not enjoying the World Series.

“I’ve been watching these World Series games on television and I haven’t seen too much good baseball,” Griffith said from his home in Indialantic, Fla., on Friday.

“The big guys are supposed to shine and they haven’t. That little (Mark) Lemke has won two games (for the Atlanta Braves), and you don’t expect him to hit the ball out of the infield.

“(The Twins’ Kirby) Puckett has hit a couple of home runs (actually three, one in the Series and two in the American League playoffs), but he isn’t getting hits at the right time and (Kent) Hrbek isn’t either.

“Pay a guy $3 million a year and you’d expect him to do something at the right time.”

Griffith sold the Twins to Minnesota banker Carl Pohlad in 1984, ending Griffith family ownership that began in 1919, when the franchise was in Washington D.C. Griffith said he is rooting for the Twins, although he says he doesn’t think they are as good as his Rod Carew-Lyman Bostock-Dan Ford teams of the 1970s, and he is upset that he isn’t here to see the games in person.

“I thought maybe they’d invite me, but I guess I don’t rate too highly with Mr. Pohlad,” Griffith said. “I was hoping to come, but the seats they sold me were in right field, and I wasn’t going to be able to tell what the pitcher was throwing.

Griffith said that until last year, he had free use of one of the Metrodome’s luxury suites as part of an original deal with Viking owner Max Winter, but that Pohlad insisted he start paying for it last year.

“I paid $40,000 for it,” Griffith said. “But I’ve got a lifetime pass from the two leagues, so this season I told ‘em to forget it. I gave $100,000 to the University of Minnesota instead. I think it was money better spent.”