Return To Minnesota
A free agent following the 1995 season, Aguilera opted to return to the Twins. Minnesota skipper Tom Kelly installed Aguilera as a starting pitcher—a position he hadn't been in since starting 11 games for the team in 1989—rather than his familiar closer role. Despite early season shoulder and wrist injuries (with the latter reportedly caused lifting his wife's suitcase the last week of spring training) forcing Aguilera to miss 6 weeks early in the season, the veteran battled his way to an 8–6 record with a 5.42 ERA in 19 starts, including a pair of complete games. With Aguilera now working as a starting pitcher, Dave Stevens led the pitching staff with 11 saves. Stevens was one of seven Twins pitchers to record a save in 1996.
The following season, the experiment of Aguilera as a starting pitcher had ended midway through spring training and the veteran returned to the bullpen. At age 35, he went 5–4 with 26 saves and a 3.82 ERA in 61 outings. In 1998, he recorded 38 saves (the most since saving 41 games in 1992) in 68 games for the Twins. In 1999, Aguilera had gone 3–1 with 6 saves and a 1.27 ERA in 17 games before the Twins traded the 37-year-old and pitcher Scott Downs to the Chicago Cubs for Kyle Lohse and Jason Ryan.
Read more about this topic: Rick Aguilera
Famous quotes containing the words return to and/or return:
“Yet I shall never return to the past, that attic.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“The chickadee and nuthatch are more inspiring society than statesmen and philosophers, and we shall return to these last as to more vulgar companions.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)