Mackey: Mentioning Mauer with Puckett... Sacrilege?

[Brock Beauchamp]

My reason for splitting Kirby's playoff series in half is to show that his clutchness and heroics almost all happened after the point where Joe Mauer's teams were already eliminated. He's not a playoff hero without the rest of his team winning games when he stunk. Kirby hit .167 through the first five games of the 1991 World Series. How "clutch" is he considered if the Twins had lost in five games?

 

That's not to say that Mauer would've had big hits had he seen a game 7 or even a game 4. He's just never had his team help him out like Puckett did.

 

Exactly. And again, Joe Mauer had a 1.000 OPS against the Yankees in 2009, despite having a double taken away from him.

 

One player cannot advance a team in the playoffs.

[UCLA_YANKEE_COLA]

I'll always *like* Puckett more. Mostly because when I watched Kirby I was 12 and he was tied with my parents and the Playboy under my bed as the most important things in the world. Now I'm 37 and I worry about global warming and my 401K.

 

In terms of actual value it's pretty close. I'd still take Kirby but that's not an argument from logic, just one from me and Miss July 1986.

[Longdistancetwins]

Killebrew

Carew

Puckett

Oliva

Mauer

Santana

 

Oliva's first 10 years he was consistently all-star and top 20 player. If they had micro surgery in the 70's, Oliva would have been a first ballot Hall member. Moving to first should help Mauer extend career and production should be better. But for now, Oliva slightly better and no question Puckett was better at this stage. Puckett was top 10 MVP player 7 out of his 12 years. Johann was great during his time with Minnesota, clearly better than Hrbek who just had longevity with Twins. Hrbek was a borderline all-star, but never was a good of a player as he could have been.

 

Thanks for keeping Tony-O in the conversation.

[twinsfan34]

People lover Winners and whoever is the iconoclastic symbol of winning often gets remembered the most.

 

"Puckett's Catch."

 

"Pucket's Homer."

 

There's no doubt what I'm talking about.

 

"Mauer's catch."

 

"Mauer's homer."

 

Ummmm...

 

And I saw both guys get 5 hits in a game. So I remember those games, but you can't say the two phrases I uttered and there be that same 'ahhhh' moment for Mauer that would get (for the majority) that you get with Puckett.