The line began forming before the sun came up, and included several hundred Twins fans by the time TwinsFest opened its doors Saturday, stretching from Target Field’s skyway entrance all the way to Target Center’s. The chance to get Joe Mauer’s autograph just four days after he became a Hall of Famer, in exchange for a $60 donation to the Twins Community Fund, was obviously irresistible for a large population of Minnesotans.
Don’t tell anyone, but there was a way to skip the line and avoid the expense. All you had to do was … well, be a member of the Twins.
“Joe, would you mind signing this for my grandpa?” righthander Louie Varland asked politely, pulling a vintage baseball card out of his pocket when Mauer arrived in the team’s TwinsFest clubhouse. “It’s not a rookie card, but it’s pretty old.”
Mauer obliged his fellow St. Paul native, one of perhaps 2,000 times he affixed his signature to photos, cards, baseballs, jerseys, caps and other collectibles on Saturday. Talking to the throngs who wanted to congratulate him on the game’s highest honor was as moving for Mauer, he said, as it was rewarding for the souvenir-hungry fans.
“It was very emotional today, walking through” the sold-out event, Mauer said, and seeing “the excitement of Twins fans, how happy and excited they are for me. I hear a lot of people are going to make the trek [to Cooperstown, N.Y., for his induction ceremony in July]. I’m excited to share that moment with them.”
That moment, and especially the speech he will make to the more than 50,000 in attendance that day, is already on his mind.
“You get one crack at it, and you want to make sure it’s good,” Mauer said. “Hopefully I can articulate the feelings that I’ve been having, especially over the last couple of months.”
Jim Thome advised him to rehearse it by himself several times, which Mauer plans to do. But he knows there is no way to prepare for the emotions he will feel when he stands on that dais.
