Talkin’ Baseball with Tony Oliva

Pop quiz, hotshot.  If 2014 Hall of Very Good inductee Tony Oliva didn’t had a bad knee, would he be in the Hall of Fame?

Plenty think so.

Consider this, from 1964-1971, the Minnesota Twins legend won three batting titles, collected nearly 1500 hits with a .313 batting average and hit an amazing 278 doubles.  Add to that eight straight All-Star appearances and two second place MVP finishes and Oliva’s first eight years rivaled few during his time in the Majors

But, in the summer of 1971, the outfielder suffered a knee injury that would signal the beginning of the end.  Oliva would play hurt the rest of the season (and his career), but never really get back to the high level he was at prior to the injury.

In the case of Oliva, it turns out, you can take the player out of the game…but you can’t take the game out of the player.  Or at least that’s what Parker Hageman from Twins Daily found out when he pinch hit (get it!) for The Hall.

HOVG:  Your career with the Minnesota Twins almost never happened when you weren’t offered a contract after your first year of stateside baseball. What is it about that time in your career that you remember the most?

OLIVA:  What I remember most about that time is that I didn’t get the opportunity to show them what I could do.  I only played three games in Spring Training, because the season was over.  We got to Spring Training too late that year.

HOVG:  In 1965, you and the Twins faced the Los Angeles Dodgers in the first World Series in Minnesota’s history. What do you recall about the atmosphere of the Twin Cities that had only just received its Major League team a few years before?

OLIVA:   That was a good year for us attendance wise and baseball wise.  But to complete the year, it was great to win the American League Championship and play in the World Series.  Everyone was so excited…the players and fans.

HOVG:  What was it like to play for Billy Martin?

OLIVA:   Exciting!  He was a very exciting and a great manager.  He loved you to play the game the right way, but for me, Billy was able to make the other managers make me stay in the game.  If the other managers were to bring another pitcher into face me, he made it more difficult for them take me out of the game.

HOVG:  You faced Nolan Ryan 51 times in your career and came away with just five singles. Was he the most challenging pitcher you faced?

OLIVA:  I think Nolan Ryan was very talented, and he was one of the hardest throwers.  I was a good breaking ball hitter, but when Nolan threw his breaking ball, I didn’t see it.  He was that good.

HOVG:  You had stated that you believed that today’s hitters are too passive in hitter’s counts. What current player reminds you most of your style of hitting?

OLIVA: I would say probably Robinson Cano.  He swings the bat and he hits the ball all over.  He likes to swing.

HOVG:  Today’s game features more shifting, more video and more data that appears to have given the edge to pitchers as strikeouts increase and batting averages decrease. In your prime, how you have fared against this type of baseball?

OLIVA:  I think that the hitters have all the stuff against them too. It’s not that different. I think that really, it is way too much information and sometimes too much information hurts the hitters because so many people take balls in the middle with 3-2.  If they say with a 2-2 count he throws fifty percent this way but you were looking for something else.  I have never seen so many people hit less than .250 in the big leagues.

HOVG:  After your knee injury, your career was prolonged with the advent of the Designated Hitter. How do you feel about that position today? Would you rather see baseball without the DH?

OLIVA:  No, I wish both leagues had the DH!  I think it has been good for baseball and the American League.  If the National League adopted this, some day it would help them too.   If today is all about the pitcher, why take a chance on getting hit by pitch, sliding and getting hurt when you can use a DH?

HOVG:  Do baseball teams do a good enough job helping Latin American players adapt and adjust both on and off the field?

OLIVA:  Today is one hundred percent better than in my day.  They try to make sure everyone is comfortable when they sign them and bring them to the United States.  There are schools that teach ballplayers to speak the English language.  If they don’t want to learn, I think it is because they don’t want to.

*****

The Hall of Very Good™ Class of 2014 is presented by Out of the Park Developments, the creators of the wildly popular baseball simulation game Out of the Park Baseball.  Out of the Park Developments has made a generous donation to The Hall.