Looking at History From Inside Out

These were the very early days of Wally World--Wally Joyner’s rookie season--and on April 26, 1986, the Angels faced not only the Minnesota Twins but Mother Nature’s curveball, too. Play was halted in the eighth inning when that wonderful architectural monument, the Metrodome, developed a hole in its fiberglass roof because of winds of 80 mph gusting through the Minneapolis area.

Wind shear brought the outdoors, well, indoors. Torrents of water doused spectators. And suddenly, the cables holding the heavy speakers and light standards appeared unstable. Fans headed for the tunnels, and the players evacuated the field. The game was stopped for about eight minutes.

“Amazing,” said Reggie Jackson. “Unbelievable. Those kinds of things, when I’m out of the game, I’m gonna miss. You can’t get those kinds of highs anywhere else.”

Having survived that, the Angels rallied and won, 7-6, on two-run homers by George Hendrick, Ruppert Jones and Joyner.

Manager Gene Mauch, naturally, had the line of the night. “If one of those speakers fell on Joyner, he would’ve hit it in the right-field seats,” Mauch said, joking.

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That’s the Way

the Cookie Crumbled

The rarely boring managerial career of Cookie Rojas included 153 games with the Angels before one fateful day against the Twins at Anaheim Stadium. His 154th game on Sept. 22, 1988, was his last.

The score line: Twins 6, Angels 2, Rojas 0.

In the seventh inning, Rojas visited the mound to talk to reliever Rich Monteleone, not intending to remove him from the game. There was one small problem: Pitching coach Marcel Lachemann had already made the trip earlier in the inning. The rules require the pitcher’s removal upon the second visit in an inning, and Rojas had to make a change without a replacement having warmed up. Headlines in the newspapers the next day gave these reviews:

“Cookie Loses Count, Angels Lose Game.”

“Once Again, Rojas Keeps Them Off Balance as Twins Get Past California.”

The Rojas era ended before lunch the next day. Moose Stubing, the Angels’ third-base coach, was named interim manager for the final eight games.

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Six Degrees of Separation

for Owner Bob Short

The late Bob Short didn’t have anything to do with the Minnesota Twins--though he did make a futile run at purchasing them in the mid-’70s. There is room for confusion, however, because he owned the Washington Senators, Part II. That franchise later became the Texas Rangers and, incidentally, the Rangers beat the Angels, 7-6, in their first game at Arlington Stadium, on April 21, 1972. The first version of the Washington Senators was the one that moved to Minnesota in 1961 and became the Twins.

Still, Short does have a strong link to both Minnesota and Southern California, having moved the Lakers from Minneapolis to Los Angeles in 1960. He sold them to Jack Kent Cooke in 1965 for the then-whopping price of $5.1 million.

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Homer Hanky

vs. Rally Monkey

There are many creative uses for the Homer Hanky. Got a cold? Well, there’s the hanky.

The Twins bring forth tears of joy or despair? Again, the hanky solves the problem.

We have one other idea. How about using the Homer Hanky to strangle the Rally Monkey?

There will certainly be no shortage of the hankies at the Metrodome. The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reported that 35,852 Homer Hankies were sold at the Metrodome on Friday for the first home playoff game in 11 years for the Twins.

As for the omnipresent monkey, regular readers of this newspaper are more than familiar with tales of the primate, seemingly told on a weekly basis. It started to reach theater-of-the-absurd levels when even the Yankees’ Derek Jeter was asked about the Monkey before Game 3.

“You’re talking about that damn monkey,” Jeter said. He did laugh about it. But last season Angel pitcher Jarrod Washburn said management was “making a mockery of the game” when a real monkey was brought onto the field.

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Angels and Twins,

Trading Places

There’s a long list of players who have worn both Angel and Twin uniforms. The players the teams have in common could have made up a fairly decent All-Star team.

Catchers: Butch Wynegar, Brian Harper.

First base: Rod Carew.

Second base: Rob Wilfong.

Third base: Gary Gaetti.

Shortstop: Leo Cardenas

Outfield: Lyman Bostock, Dave Winfield, Tom Brunansky.

Designated hitter: Chili Davis.

Pitchers: Dean Chance, Bert Blyleven.

Reliever: Doug Corbett.

Managers: Gene Mauch, Bill Rigney.

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Inside Minnesota,

California Politics

The Minnesota-California political battle of the present: Gov. Jesse Ventura vs. Gov. Gray Davis.

Davis was in The Times’ building for a debate against challenger Bill Simon on Monday, but we missed the opportunity to ask him his opinion on the upcoming Angel-Twin series. As for Ventura, he is capable of asking any question at any time.

In May 2001, he asked the Dalai Lama whether he had ever seen the movie “Caddyshack.”

Then there’s the Minnesota-California political battle of the past, if you can call it one: Richard Nixon defeated Hubert Humphrey in the 1968 presidential election.

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Music to Their Ears

in West and Midwest

The Singing Cowboy, the late Gene Autry, the former Angel owner, was frequently mentioned on TV in the latter stages of the series-clinching victory over the Yankees on Saturday.

Minnesota’s a musical heritage includes Bob Dylan, Prince, the Replacements and Husker Du.

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She’s Going

to Make It After All

How about Mary Richards vs. Lou Grant? There is a bronze statue of a smiling Mary Richards a few blocks from the Metrodome.

For many, “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” was the first real glimpse of the Twin Cities. Her gruff boss, of course, was Lou Grant.

Newspapers and Los Angeles got their own show in “Lou Grant,” which was set in Southern California. But there’s been no Lou Grant statue anywhere in Southern California.

The numbers aren’t too close. “Lou Grant” racked up 13 Emmys in five seasons and “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” recorded almost 30 in seven seasons.

Edge to Mary.