
Mike Kelley, who had been with the Saints when the Association began, by this time owned the Millers.
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Minneapolis made its first appearance in the Junior World Series in 1932. Unfortunately, the Saints lost that year to the Baltimore Orioles in the Junior World Series, a post-season matchup of the champions of the American Association and International League that had been played off and on since 1904. 701, Association records that were never matched. Led by the pitching of 27-game winner Charley Sea Lion Hall and the offensive contributions of players like Joe Goldie Rapp, Lee Dressen, and Joe Riggert, the Saints won 115 games and produced a winning percentage of. In addition, the Minnesota teams shared the Association record with nine pennants apiece. The Millers ended up with the best winning percentage of all the teams to play in the league over that period. Paul played in the American Association for 59 seasons. Under a new manager, Pongo Joe Cantillon, the Millers rattled off three consecutive American Association championships. But the Minneapolis club came alive in 1910. The Millers had a rockier beginning in the Association, finishing seventh (out of eight teams) their first two years. Paul got off to a good start, winning pennants in two of its first three years in the Association. Managed by Mike Kelley, who also played first base in an infield that included future Hall-of-Famer Miller Huggins at second, St. Paul Saints became charter members in a new minor league, the American Association, that began in 1902. The Millers lasted a year longer than the Saints but were among four teams dropped from the league when Johnson finally reached his goal, turning the Western League (by this time renamed the American League) into a major league in 1901.īoth the Minneapolis Millers and St. Three years later, Comiskey moved the team again, this time taking it to Chicago, where it became (and still exists as) the White Sox. Comiskey owned and managed the Saints, who played in a small ballpark off of University Avenue and Dale Street before moving a mile west to Lexington Park in 1897. Paul got a team in the Western League when Charles Comiskey, a confidant and close friend at the time with Ban Johnson, purchased the Western Leagues Sioux City franchise and moved it to St.
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The Millers won the citys first professional baseball championship when they captured the Western League flag in 1896, a season that also marked the end of Athletic Park and the beginning of Nicollet Park, a structure that seemed spacious in contrast to its predecessor but one that would eventually also be considered a great park for hitters. The teams slugger, Perry Moose Werden, hit 42 home runs in 1894 and topped that with 45 the following year, establishing a professional single-season home run record that stood until Babe Ruth took up the business. The Minneapolis Millers then played in a tiny downtown ballpark called Athletic Park, which was so small was that the Millers produced some impressive offensive numbers while playing there.

The leagues creator, a Cincinnati sportswriter named Ban Johnson, hoped to eventually transform the Western League into a major league to challenge the established National League. Paul came back with teams in various leagues over the next decade, and both were a key part of the Western League in the 1890s, an organization that had some lofty aims. Minnesota was without professional baseball in 1885, but Minneapolis and St. Paul ended up with the distinction of being Minnesota’s first major league team. By playing nine games in the Union Association, all on the road, St. The two survivors finished their seasons by transferring to the Union Association, a major league that was in its only season of operation.

Most of the clubs were on shaky financial ground and disbanded during the season. In 1884, a fully professional minor league, the Northwestern League, had teams in Minneapolis, St. Professionalism crept into Minnesota baseball through the 1870s. The areas earliest teams were amateur nines, representing cities of all sizes throughout the state, a few of them even organized before the Civil War.

The roots of baseball in Minnesota are part of the post-Civil War baseball boom in America. Author of On to Nicollet: The Glory and Fame of the Minneapolis Millers
