Griffin Jax wasn’t the only Air Force Capt. Jax at Target Field on Wednesday. Well, not if you count the airspace above the ballpark.
On land, in the air, it’s a family reunion for Twins pitcher Griffin Jax at Target Field
As his younger brother and sister-in-law streaked across the sky in fighter jets in memory of 9/11, other relatives packed stands.
The Minnesota Star Tribune
September 12, 2024 at 1:07AM
Capt. Parker Jax, younger brother to the Twins reliever, and Parker’s wife, Capt. Chandler Jax, flew two of the four F-35 Lightning IIs that buzzed the stadium in a flyover at the end of the national anthem before the game. And Capt. Carson Jax, Parker’s twin brother, stood on the mound where Jax regularly faces big league hitters and threw the ceremonial first pitch, with his brother as catcher.
“It’s cool. It’s the first time in a while that we’ve all been able to get together, so my parents are pumped for that,” Jax — the one who pitches for the Twins — said before the game. “There hasn’t been a holiday in the past couple of years that we’ve all been able to make, so it’s special.”
So special, in fact, that the stadium was practically packed with family members, he said.
“Oh gosh. My family, the five of us, and all of our wives. We’ve got my dad, my mom, my mom’s dad, his wife, my dad’s brother, his girlfriend, my dad’s sister and her boyfriend,” Jax said. “My mom’s best friend is here. My brother’s wife’s dad is here, too. So there are a lot of people.”
A family reunion based around the occasion of the Twins’ commemoration of the 9/11 terrorist attack is unusual, but Jax said his family, with their extensive military background — like the pitcher, both of his brothers graduated from the Air Force Academy, a short drive from where they grew up in Colorado — understand the meaning of the day.
“It’s got special meaning for not only me but for other pilots out there,” he said. “It’s just a really cool opportunity to fuse the two together. And Minnesota has a pretty big military community as well.”
Griffin Jax was never a pilot — he was recruited to the academy to play baseball and is the first graduate to make the majors — but he tagged along on a “familiarization flight” in an F-16, he said, “and it was insane. … An ex-baseball player academy guy [was] flying me, so I got to talk to him a lot about it, learn about their lives and see what it entailed.”
His brothers and sister-in-law are stationed at Hill Air Force Base, just north of Salt Lake City, as part of the 421st Fighter Squadron’s “Black Widows,” and flew to Minnesota on Tuesday. For the ceremony, they flew their F-35s about 30 miles north of Minneapolis, then turned toward the stadium, arriving at the precise moment the anthem ended.
The crowd roared at the inspiring sight, but to the pilots, it’s not a party. It’s training, Jax said.
“I don’t know if it’s super-common knowledge, but these flyovers are simulating dropping a bomb over a specific target. Target Field is the target today, no pun intended,” Jax said. “They have to coordinate a specific time because it’s to the second. They’ll operate as if they were dropping a bomb, for their coordination as a unit.”
Margot activated
The Twins activated Manuel Margot from the injured list Wednesday, his strained right adductor muscle now healed. Rookie outfielder Michael Helman, who appeared in seven games and went 3-for-8 with two doubles, was optioned back to Class AAA St. Paul.
Christian Vázquez also returned to the team, two days after the birth of his son Diland, and catcher Jair Camargo was returned to St. Paul, too.
“Initially, [Vázquez] wasn’t going to take a day” on the paternity list, Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. “Then I told him he was not welcome here.”
Camargo didn’t get into a game while Vázquez was away, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t perform impressively. The rookie put on a spectacular power display during batting practice Tuesday, hitting several upper-deck shots to both right and left field.
“We should let him go out there and let the other team watch him hit. He’s hitting opposite-field home runs into the upper deck, things like that,” Baldelli joked. “Even from guys with incredible talent, you still don’t see things like that very often.”
Saints lose on walk-off
Jonathan Rodriguez hit a walk-off homer run off reliever Diego Castillo with two outs in the ninth inning, and the St. Paul Saints fell 7-6 to the host Columbus Clippers. Diego A. Castillo hit a three-run homer to put the Saints up 4-0 in the fifth inning.
The Twins don’t have much going for them right now in a desperate and slump-filled September. But they do have one big advantage over their closest pursuers in the wild card race.
