Rounds 1-12 Results:

1. Herb Carneal
2. Tom Kelly
3. The Metrodome
4. Jack Morris
5. Win Twins Theme
6. Dick Bremer
7. Bob Casey
8. Target Field
9. Metropolitan Stadium
10. Judge Harry Crump
11. Paul Molitor
12. Dan Gladden

In some ways, this entire poll series was created for Dan Gladden. Though seemingly a candidate for my “top all-time Twins” poll series last offseason, the Dazzle Man contributed negative WAR values in his MN tenure, so I couldn’t bring myself to include him on that list.

Yet, Gladden’s hustle & aesthetic—those flowing locks—endeared him to fans who watched him capture two rings with the team.

He’d also probably have been voted “least likely to have a career in radio”, yet he has accomplished exactly that! He has successfully parlayed an uber-unique persona into a long baseball career.

Next: The skipper who brought the Twins back to relevance this millennium.

The Star Tribune Sports Section

• Gather ‘round, children, and let me tell you of a time before the internet. In the hardscrabble analog age of human existence, following your local sporting nine was not a moment-by-moment affair. Instead, a rolled-up newsprint assemblage that magically appeared on your doorstep to meet the rising sun was often your best bet for baseball news.
• No shade to east Twin Cities suburbanites who received the Pioneer Press, but the west-side’s Star Tribune had unassailable sports coverage that provided beat opinions and box scores to pore over for hours.

Little Big League

• When the Baby Boomers starting getting nostalgic in the 1990s, baseball was on the tip of their cinematic tongues. In 1994, an art-imitating-life story of the woebegone Twins hit theaters.
• Filmed at the Metrodome and featuring the vocal talents of John Gordon’s “Wally Holland”, Little Big League and its adolescent Billy Heywood gave young Twins fans a dream scenario. Whether teaching us math or exploring baseball’s brand of humor, Little Big League remains an all-time classic in these parts.

TC Bear

• When you attend a baseball game as a child, you aren’t concerned with stats or standings (okay, maybe I was, but I digress).
• You simply marvel at the grandness—sights, smells, sounds—of it all. It is very possible your first Minnesota Twins memory (even if you have trouble accessing it in grey matter folds) is high-fiving TC Bear in the Dome/Target Field concourse or observing his silly antics on the pregame field or atop the home dugout.

Photo by Bruce Kluckhohn/Getty Images

Jim Thome

• For years, Jim Thome tormented the Twins—Rick Reed in particular—as a member of the Cleveland Guardians or Chicago White Sox.
• In 2010, Big Jim continued his AL Central tour and jumped onboard the Twins for Target Field’s inaugural campaign.
• Providing power not seen in these parts since Harmon Killebrew was in the batter’s box, Thome gave the new ballpark its first magical moment and starred in a legendary commercial. A year later, he belted home run #600 in MN duds.

 Photo by Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images

Ron Gardenhire

• Gardy almost never got the opportunity to manage the Minnesota Twins. Shortly after his acceptance of the post, the Twins were nearly contracted by MLB. Fortunately, with Judge Harry Crump providing the save, the band played on with Gardenhire at the helm.
• All he did going forward was transform a wayward franchise into perennial division-winners (six AL Central crowns from 2002-2010).
• Gardy mixed Tom Kelly’s fundamentals-based pitching-and-defense approach with a gregarious personality that got the most out of players (especially scrappers like he himself had been). His umpire tirades remain legendary.