OaklandFan

He was one of several players throughout the league who had career high numbers that year. At the time, he commented on the high number of young or rookie pitchers he had the good fortune to face that season, that he hit well off those young, mistake-making, pitchers, and that the new ball parks being built in the early and mid 90s were more hitter friendly than the old parks. He left Oakland after that season to go home to Minnesota. At the time, his reasoning, at least to the public in the Bay Area, was that his kids were getting to an age where he didn't want them to be shuffling around from Minnesota to Arizona, to Oakland during the school year. He turned down several offers more lucrative than the offer he took with the Twins, including a huge ( I can't remember the exact number, something like $18 million/4 years) offer from Toronto to be able to keep his family in one place year round. I realize that in your blog you do not come out and make an accusation of steroid use. It is likely that being an A's fan makes me a bit more sensitive to hints of shenanigans than I would be if my team didn't spawn Jose Canseco, but it seems irresponsible to me to call someone's reputation into question based on nothing more than something you can't explain. His explanation seems perfectly reasonable to me. It makes less sense that he would take PEDs after years of not taking PEDs so that he'd have a big season in order to take an enormous pay-cut and go to a team not likely to make the playoffs for the remainder of his career. That's ridiculous.

I've been a sideline observer of the Twins since the days when they were a thorn in the side of my beloved A's. It's been interesting to read the fan discussions regarding the open manager position. The majority of conversations I've read have left me with one overriding wish, to deliver a message to the bench coach: COME BACK TO OAKLAND, STEINY! Whether it's because you were too close to Gardy, or you're just not enough of a change, I don't know, but the fans in Minnesota don't seem to have a clue what you're worth. We do.