2020 Twinsfest- Day 1

Today kicked off my most favorite weekend of the year. Twinsfest was shortened to two days this year so I was unsure what to expect.
The day started for me after requesting the kids to leave school at 1pm. This year Cami decided to bring a couple friends along so there was a car full heading down to Target Field. We arrived at 2pm and were in a pretty good spot in the parking ramp (skyway entrance from Ramp A). The plan was for Caden and I to head to Johan Santana’s line first and Cami and her two friends to head to get Max Kepler and his group. Two of Cami’s friends LOVE Max Kepler so I wanted to make sure they could meet him. Cami had to leave early tonight because of volleyball practice so I asked her to go to the Carew group line after she was done with the Kepler line. That did not work out as they got cut off from the Carew line as time ran out. So, the girls decided to run around and have fun at the ballpark doing the games and checking things out. While I got in line for the Johan Santana group, Caden went through the Rocco Baldelli/Ehire Adrianza/Jorge Polanco/Fernando Romero/Mike Bell line and got each guy to sign something. He then got in line with me for Johan Santana. I need a TON of Santana cards for all the projects I am working on. It seems like when he was with the Twins he had a Cy Young card, an All Star card, a base card, a couple league leader cards, and so on so I have a lot of catching up to do. Caden and I went through the Johan Santana/Jacque Jones/Carlos Silva/Tony Diaz/Sean Poppen line. After this, we went our separate ways. Let me say this now… Caden was a superstar. He waited in so many lines, without complaining, to get autographs for me. I kept telling him over and over how much I appreciated it. It got to the point where he was like “I GOT IT! YOU ARE WELCOME!” What an awesome kid. Caden headed to the Lewis Thorpe/Jorge Alcala/Dakota Chalmers/Luke Raley line and then to the Brusdar Graterol/LaMonte Wade Jr/Cody Stashak/Devin Smeltzer line while I went to the Royce Lewis/Brent Rooker/Jordan Balazovic/Gilberto Celestino/Jhoan Duran and Randy Dobnak/Bert Blyleven/Glen Perkins/Terry Steinbach/Brian Raabe lines. When I spoke with Royce Lewis, I told him he had a heck of an Arizona Fall League season. He replied that the hot air down there really helped the ball fly. Between the two lines, I headed down to say hi to my pal Tony Swann and his son Spencer. Tony is the guy who collects Carlton Fisk games played tickets. He is down to like 37 tickets from Fisk’s entire career. Tony is awesome too. He has helped me out many times with my ticket collection rarely asking for anything in return. As it turned out, we chatted for a few minutes and he asked me to run a bat to his son who was waiting in line to have Rich Hill sign it. It was a really cool bat with a ton of pitchers who threw no hitters. When I was there, Spencer asked if I needed anything from anyone else in the group and I gave him a Josh Donaldson card and headed to the Dobnak group. I gotta say that this station was the highlight of my night. First, I had Bert Blyleven sign a table tent from a Wendy’s promotion for Bert’s Burger from years ago. He looked at it and said “I remember this shit!”. Mind you, at this point Bert had a few beers and had one sitting on the table next to him. It was hilarious. When I got to Glen Perkins, I had a debut ticket for him and asked him to sign it with ML Debut. He did and I asked him if he had a ticket from the game. He said he thought his parents might but he was not sure and he did not have one. I had an extra so I gave it to him. He was like “Wow! Thank you! Thank you very much!”. I gave Kent Hrbek an extra debut ticket for his game a few years ago and he appreciated it as well. I really like sharing things like this with the players. I asked Glen if he remembered it and that I noticed he came in relief of Johan Santana. He said “The first batter I faced was Carlos Pena and I struck him out!” I am always amazed by what players remember from a game or event in their career.
While I was at the Dobnak group, Caden was at the Dan Gladden/Kent Hrbek/Tim Laudner/Tony Oliva line. He would have been cut off in that line but they kept it open about 15 minutes longer so everyone could get their autographs. I thought that was a really cool gesture by the guys signing.
Caden and I met up and we headed home looking forward to tomorrow, the final day of Twinsfest 2020.
The autographs we all got today are:
-Eddie Rosario- 2018 Topps Heritage #262, 2019 Gypsy Queen #37, 2019 Allen & Ginter #190
-Mitch Garver- 2019 Topps Now Post Season Team PS-94, 11.07.2019 Topps Now, 08.31.2019 Topps Now
-Max Kepler- 2019 Topps Heritage 378, 2019 Topps Now Post Season Team PS-105, 2019 Topps Now Opening Day #141, Topps Now 06.06.209 Bonus ODB-13, 2019 Topps (given to Cami’s friend), 2019 Gypsy Queen (given to Cami’s friend)
-Rocco Baldelli- Managerial Debut ticket from 03.28.2019
-Ehire Adrianza- 2019 Topps #608, 04.29.2019 Topps Now #155
-Jorge Polanco- Cycle ticket from 04.05.2019
-Fernando Romero- ML Debut ticket from 05.02.2018
-Mike Bell- 2019 Topps Target Field card #424
-Johan Santana- 2007 Topps Cy Young card #321, 2008 Topps #115
-Jacque Jones- June/July 2002 Twins Magazine, April/May 2005 Twins Magazine
-Carlos Silva- Ticket from 05.30.2005 when he threw a complete game in only 74 pitches, 2 @ 2008 Topps Heritage #187
-Tony Diaz- 2019 Topps Target Field card #424, Signature Card
-Sean Poppen- 2 @ ML Debut tickets from 06.19.2019 with one with “MLB Debut”
-Lewis Thorpe- ML Debut ticket from 06.30.2019
-Jorge Alcala- ML Debut ticket from 09.21.2019
-Dakota Chalmers- Sweetspot OMLB
-Luke Raley- Sweetspot OMLB
-Brusdar Graterol- 2019 Topps Now Post Season Team PS-101
-LaMonte Wade Jr- ML Debut ticket from 07.28.2019
-Cody Stashak- Game used baseball that he used in his ML Debut for his 3rd career strikeout
-Devin Smeltzer- ML Debut ticket from 08.04.2019
-Royce Lewis- Bowman Next AZ Fall league AFL-37
-Brent Rooker- 2019 Topps Heritage Minor League #146, 2019 Bowman #BP-45
-Jordan Balazovic- Sweetspot OMLB
-Gilberto Celestino- Sweetspot OMLB
-Jhoan Duran- Sweetspot OMLB
-Randy Dobnak- ML Debut ticket from 08.09.2019 with “ML Debut!”
-Bert Blyleven- Wendy’s Table Tent
-Glen Perkins- ML Debut ticket from 09.21.2006 with “MLB Debut”
-Terry Steinbach- 1999 Topps #146
-Brian Raabe- Signature Card
-Dan Gladden- 1991 Topps #778
-Kent Hrbek- 1989 Upper Deck #213 (for Mark C- clubnuts on SCN)
-Tim Laudner- 1987 Twins Team card #206
-Tony Oliva- Big League Baseball 1965 Magazine