Torii Hunter told the Star Tribune's LaVelle Neal on Monday that he is going to retire after playing 17 seasons (plus cups of instant coffee in 1997 and 1998). Hunter finished his career this season for the Twins, his original organization and the team where he had been the center fielder from 1999 to 2007.
There was much made of Hunter's leadership in his one-season return to the Twins. There was good reason for that: Torii introduced an extra competitive edge to the position players that helped to push the 2015 Twins to the plus side of .500 after the worst four-season stretch in franchise history.
There were a couple of times this summer when I saw Torii in the far corner of the home clubhouse at Target Field, serving as the media's answer man for what had taken place in that day's game, and found myself laughing slightly.
The reason was seeing Hunter as the elder of the Twins was always amazing, as I was in Baltimore on Aug. 22, 1997, when he came into the visitors clubhouse at Camden Yards to join the big-league club. He was wide-eyed and with the extra-large version of the smile that would become a trademark.
Hunter still was more a suspect than hot prospect that day, even though it was his fifth season since being the Twins' No. 1 draft choice in 1993. The first of his 2,372 regular-season games in the big leagues consisted of pinch running for Terry Steinbach in the ninth inning of a 3-1 loss to the Orioles on the 22nd.
He stayed in Baltimore one more day and went back to the minors. He was with the Twins very briefly in 1998, and didn't earn a real shot until 1999.
Just for giggles, here were the items (and publication dates) that I sent to the Star Tribune on Hunter's first two days in the big leagues with the Twins.
AUG. 23, 1997:
