Eds, Ranked

[RandBalls Stu]

With the looming departure of Eddie Rosario, Twins Daily looks back at the storied history of Eds, Eduardos, and Eddies on the Minnesota Twins.Eddie Rosario marks the last of the Eds in what was inarguably the greatest stretch of Eds in Minnesota Twins history. You’ll one day tell your grandchildren about how you could go to Target Field and watch Rosario, Eduardo Escobar, and Eduardo Nunez on the same damn day. They’ll stare at you in slackjawed disbelief. It’s like finding out college used to cost fifty bucks. No one will believe you.

 

With this in mind, Twins Daily is going to rank all eight Eds in Minnesota Twins history. There is absolutely zero sabermetric analysis going into this, so please know that your complaints, while mathematically sound and displaying care, rigor, and intelligence, will go unheeded.

 

8. Ed Palmquist. Played in Minnesota’s inaugural 1961 season. Not a lot of info out there on the middle reliever, but he was a longtime resident of Grants Pass, Oregon, which was named for Ulysses Grant after he beat the hell out of Civil War participation trophy recipients The Confederacy at Vicksburg.

 

7. Edwar Colina. Pitched in one game last season. Recorded one out and has an ERA of 81.00. We hope it goes down.

 

6. Ed Hodge. Played for the Twins in 1984. I don’t remember him at all, and I remember a lot about the 1984 Twins. Ron Davis blew a save in all 162 games, a record that will never be topped given how relievers are currently used.

 

5. Eddie Bane. Bonus baby who went straight from Arizona State to the Twins in the '70s but never panned out. Later became a major league scout. Two things of note: 1) Knocked Dave Winfield and the Gophers out of the College World Series. 2) Drafted Mike Trout for the Angels. We should all never pan out like that. Nice Reusse column if you’re a Strib subscriber here.

 

4. Eduardo Nunez. This is where the going gets tough, but life is about making difficult choices. An All-Star in 2016, Nunez is perhaps best known for working at the Krusty Krab alongside Spongebob Squarepants.

 

3. Eddie Rosario. Like I said, this is really hard! I think Gleeman’s assessment of him in The Athletic is definitive, but you can tell me I’m a stupid idiot in the comments. But it’s really Aaron’s fault, so keep that top of mind and maybe yell at him instead. Definitely yell at him instead.

 

2. Eduardo Escobar. I can’t tell you that Escobar is a better player than Rosario or even Nunez. What I can tell you is that I can’t find any pictures of those two gifted athletes milking a cow at his job. What I can tell you is that their farewells to Minnesota didn’t involve a crude, wonderful Photoshop rainbow. What I can tell you is that Eduardo Escobar is a hero to all of us, in ways big and small, every day. I love you, Eduardo Escobar.

 

1. Eddie Guardado. A closer who throws 87 mph with not a terrific amount of movement feels like a prank now, but I swear on Ron Gant’s forward momentum it happened. Gets the number one spot due to giving the entire state of Minnesota a heart attack in Game 5 of the 2002 ALDS but still getting the final out. To wit: Single, groundout, double, THREE-RUN HOMER, pop-up, single, foul pop-up, Twins knock out the Moneyball A’s 5-4. Right up there with Game 7 and Game 163 for pure misery before absolute, boundless joy. And he did this FOR YEARS. He’s the top Ed.

 

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[JDubs]

Civil War participation trophy recipients The Confederacy

 

 

*Italian chef finger kiss thing*

[David Youngs]

Let's get a list of Twins with the best grandpa names. I'd put Ed up there with Kent, Rod, and Lew Ford (would be higher if spelled 'Lou').

[ashbury]

You and Aaron Gleeman are idiots, and went to ten-dollar colleges at most. Omitted from the list were Tom "Ed" Edens and Dave "Ed" Edwards.

 

You may be interested to know that the advertisements I received on this page were for ED medications. Since ad placement draws on possibly tenuous inferences from cookies on a computer, perhaps the degree of interest will be muted.

[theBOMisthebomb]

"You’ll one day tell your grandchildren about how you could go to Target Field and watch Rosario, Eduardo Escobar, and Eduardo Nunez on the same damn day." You think I won't?

[tony&rodney]

Wait, I saw the jersey number 57.

[ashbury]

Wait, I saw the jersey number 57.

That could have been Scott AldrED, 1996-97.

 

[jkcarew]

Eddie Bane didn’t knock the Gophers out of the CWS...although he beat them.

 

The Gophers were knocked out by USC (Fred Lynn, Roy Smalley) when USC scored 8 runs in the 9th inning of the semifinal to beat the Gophers 8-7. Kinda hard to forget that one if you happened to be over the age of about 10 when it happened.