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If you’re a Minnesota Twins fan, and especially if you’re a big enough fan to have found this site, you need to find a way to visit spring training in Fort Myers. If you’re not, I expect it is because you’re not sure what there is to do there. This story, which we’ll run annually on Twins Daily is to help you find the best stuff to do at spring training.I don’t remember which year I first attended spring training, but I remember the exact date when I decided I would never miss it again: February 28th, 2014. I remember that date because we all remember the winter of 2013-14, or as Minnesotan’s refer to it: “that really awful winter.” That doesn’t sound especially harsh, but when Minnesotans single out one winter as really awful, that’s high praise. They’re all really awful. But 2013-14 had the coldest average temperature of any winter since 1978, plus a ton of snow. It also saved the worst for last. February, which is when Minnesotans are desperately searching for a little hope, was an all-time crummy month. When I boarded the plane at MSP that day, I looked at my phone and it was -10 degrees Fahrenheit, which is 42 degrees below the average high for that day. And when I landed in Fort Myers it was 80 and sunny and I was thunderstruck by just how dumb I had been for the previous 47 years of my life. I’ve come to feel strongly that we’re all doing it wrong. We should all escape for at least a long weekend to Fort Myers. And since I also get dozens of people asking me for advice for spring training, I hope this story serves as both a guide and inspiration to plan your own escape. I’ve already covered the weather, but it’s worth pointing out that even if there wasn’t baseball, escaping to 80 and sunny isn’t just nice for the time you’re there, it also lessens the rage with which you shovel out the driveway after that DAMN SNOWPLOW guys comes by AGAIN. It’s the length of the Minnesota winter that is the real killer. Knowing your winter has a definitive break, even temporarily, is incredibly therapeutic. That is all true if there wasn’t baseball. But here’s the thing - there IS baseball. It is probably the most concentrated and accessible baseball you’ll ever experience. Visiting the CenturyLink Sports Complex Visiting the Twins complex to see players up close is a morning activity. The accessibility is highest in the morning when players walk to and from their practice fields. You can see the route below, but the best place to stake out is over in the concrete area by those columns on the right. That’s where you’ll see a lot of people hanging around by 10 AM or so. Download attachment: Player Fan Path.png The players go out and come back in shifts, usually starting 9:15 or so though sometimes later. They come back in around 11 or noon, and that’s the best time to shake their hands or get an autograph or picture. You have to be patient and you get what you get - the times vary, the players vary, it’s a loosely organized congenial activity. Sometimes they can’t or won’t stop, but often they do. Here are Stephen Gonsalves, Kyle Gibson and Jose Berrios in 2019 all giving autographs as they came back from their morning workouts Saturday morning. Download attachment: Pitchers signing autographs.png Scrumming up with other fans and rubbing elbows with the players is certainly a draw, but it’s also fun to watch the players practice their craft. Want to watch a practice session, including someone like Tom Kelly or Torii Hunter help instruct minor leaguers? You can do that. They even built stands: Download attachment: Practice Field and Stands.png Or want to watch players take batting practice? The batting cages are right here, and you can watch up close through that chain link fence upon which these banners hang. Download attachment: Batting Cages.png The same is true of throwing in the bullpen. Here we see La Tortuga waiting for some pitchers to report and work on some of their mechanics. Download attachment: Bullpen.png You don’t have to worry about parking on days where there aren’t games. The stadium doesn’t have any concessions, but most of the action is over by lunchtime, so you have your afternoons free to bake on a beach, if you like. Watching Prospects Any Twins prospect who is on the 40-man roster is with the big league team at the beginning of spring training. And may who are not are still invited as non-roster invitees, so check the spring training roster to see which of your favorite players are with the big league club. But if you are really into prospects, you’ll want to attend spring training starting the second week of March. That’s when the minor league camp starts up, so all of the fields are filled with top prospects and hopeful suspects doing drills and playing games. This includes many of the prospects that began spring training with the big club. When they are whittled off the roster, they move to the minor league complex. If you would like to know which prospects are working out at which level, stop by the minor league office. They have sheets that say which players are working out with which teams, (AA, AAA, etc.) and also the minor league game schedule. Watching Games And then the games start. Starting the last weekend of February, you will have real live baseball most days from 1:00 to 4:00 PM. There are games most every day, in more intimate minor league stadiums, with prices that are closer to the minors than the majors. Download attachment: Hammond Seats.png Plus, if the Twins aren’t home, Fort Myers is one of the few cities that hosts two minor league teams: the Red Sox park is just a handful of miles away. Or take a one-hour to three-hour road trip to follow the Twins. All the road games are no further than that. When To Visit Once per day at spring training, you’ll hear a player, Twins employees or media members ask out loud “What the hell day is it today?” The daily routine doesn’t vary much, meaning Tuesdays are the same as Thursdays are the same as Saturdays. That said, you may want to visit at different times during spring training depending on what you want to get out of it. If you want the best access to players, the time to come is before the games start. Pitchers and catchers start their workouts on a Wednesday. The following Monday the batters all need to be there for their workouts, but the truth is most are there several days earlier. Excitement is high, and the players are feeling fresh. The interaction is definitely higher early in spring training. If you want to see games, you have a choice. If you want to see the big names, visit at the end of March when most of the roster cuts have happened. The players who will be making the roster will be getting some extra innings, though they’ll still likely be pulled after two or three at-bats. If you want to see some top prospects, come early in the game schedule, when Twins coaches will go out of their way to make sure top players get a live-action look for their benefit. You can see some of these guys in later games, too, but it will be more hit-and-miss, and usually limited to late innings. Early in the schedule you might see them starting alongside Twins regulars. Quit Thinking About It and Do It For a baseball fan, it’s almost hard to believe a place like this exists. The bad news is that it probably won’t, not in exactly the same manner, even next year. The consensus opinion is that every year, all the amenities get a little nicer, but the access gets a little tighter. If that idea bothers you, I promise you - you won’t care. Find a way to get here. You’ll hear the pop of a mitt and feel the sun on your shoulders and you’ll wonder, like I did, why it took you so long. Download attachment: Gibson and Kid.png Click here to view the article

What a difference a year makes, not only did the squad reporting to this years 2014 Florida Instructional League look much different than last year but so did the newly renovated facility. When entering the new Player Academy, you're greeted by a large hill that was constructed for new strength exercises and a sign stating "This is Twin Territory" and a 12 ft picture of Kirby Puckett and the quote "And we'll see you tomorrow night!" Around the corner are more signage showing the Twins past success and telling everyone "The Road Begins Here". While waiting around, I was able to find the iteneriery for this past Thursday. Further down is the brand new three story housing unit and office for the Players' Developmental Academy, and let me tell you the Twins did this right. That is except for the marked up rates they charge the players for simple things such as contact solution. Don't tell but I sweet talked my way into the first floor unit and it was nice, furnished with ping-pong tables, pool tables, conference rooms and offices. The walls are decorated with blown up old school Twin baseball cards and ESPN magazine covers while Baseball America magazines strewn about with the MLB network playing on flatscreen TVs. The players live on the second and third floor and are roomed with a teammate unless they have family and they are housed together. The best part of this experience is that I'm the only "regular" person out there with all these players, coaches and trainers. With the 10am game cancelled due to wet conditions, the day started off as a fizzle and I was honestly about to leave but who do I see come out of the Academy Complex but Bryon Buxton and the rest of the Instructional League squad. Buxton was the first player out and has definitely hardened over the last two years that I've seen him in that he doesn't like the chit chat or pictures or autographs as much as when he was fresh out of a small Georgian high school. Following Buxton were the rest of the Instructional League positional players minus Nick Gordon while the pitchers stayed behind in the Complex listening to a Rasmussen speech and watching video. At 9:30am the position players reported to what they loving refer to as "The Hill". At first glance it doesn't appear ominious but if you talk to any player out there they hated it by the end. The first player taken was Miguel Guzman and boy can he fly while the catchers were all near the end of the picking process with Alex Swim getting the notorious last pick and crying about it. Kanzler ended up with Rainis Silvia, Jorge Fernandez, Nelson Molina, Trey Vavra, Tanner English,Tyree Davis, Rafael Valera and Stu Turner. , before deciding on slow-fast-slow with his placement of runners and picking Rainis Silvia to go first which Rainis was pleading not to do. Jorge Fernandez is quiet the character, very verbal with encouragement, quick wit and always cracking a joke. I said that I wasn't impressed with last year's strength and conditioning regime well this time around leadman Eric Beiser pulled out a great drill. First the players foot tapped the box 10x each foot then hit the ladder, followed by the medicine ball which they threw laterally to each side 6x times. The race was then to the sandpit (think long jump placement) where they ran halfway down then backwards with running forward-back-forward full length. After that was slamming the medicine ball 6x down then running up the 45 degree hill "duck walking" with tubing, Then off to 10 3 count burpees that many players turned into 5 count (including pushup), that was followed by reverse duck walk, 30 second plank, side shuffle, sprint up the hill, 10 second side planks, side shuffle down the hill, jumps up the hill, backwards lunges down the hill, and a sprint up the hill for the finish. Tommy Watkins, the FIL manager, loves giving his players crap, riding them hard, most of the players thought he was joking when he said we're hitting after this but he was serious. , , Believe it or not, this drill killed several of the players with three of them puking (Zack Larson, Tyree Davis and Brian Navarreto). much like Navarreto while Davis had to be carried off by Rainis Silvia and Nelson Molina with Jorge Fernandez fanning him off. Tyree told me, I never had to do this even in football, they said you work every muscle but I only feel it here (quadriceps), I know what I'm doing this offseason (pointing to the hill), I've never had to workout like this before. Buxton just stood on the sidelines and watched as he's nowhere near in-shape, he's only hitting in the the cage at this point. Tyler Kuresa asked Buxton if he had done this drill before which Byron replied yeah but I was in shape then which is a complete lie because "the hill" is a new feature to the complex. , thus making Kanzler group having to hit second and clean-up the hill and collect balls in the cage. While the positional players were finishing up with their drill, the pitchers came out at about 1030am, many of the positionals asked if the pitchers had to do the same drill which was replied with an emphatic NO by the pitchers (Michael Cederoth and CK Irby). To which Tyler Kuresa replied back, "gotta work on covering first today"? Eric Rassmussen asked Field Coordinator Joe Lepel if he had two catchers that weren't tanked so . Of course that was after the pitchers played catch and long toss for 20 minutes. After JT Chagois finished I was able to call him over and get him to talk briefly about his recovery processs and . According to JT, the arm is feeling the best it has in a long time but he's having trouble with his location and command. He says he doesn't know how hard he's throwing which I'm sure was a lie, but according to a source he was 96-98mph in his last outing. He's throwing mainly fastballs at this point and that's all he threw in his side session. The source I talked to said they plan to take it slow with JT with him possibly starting off in extended spring training and/or Fort Myers and see from there. From my perspective Chagois seems like a genuinely nice kid and I wish him the best of luck but don't think he needs too much because that ball just explodes out of his hand. The pitchers then reported off to the inside arena while the hitters continued to hit in the cages, the rain started to come and I departed. Hopefully next week the rain subsides enough to get a game in when I'll be back the 27th. I hope you enjoyed the ramblings of a baseball fan. *I have no affiliation with any club, organization, company, etc the above blog is just one baseball fan's look inside the not often covered Florida Instructional League.