by Dennis Dalman
There’s more than one way to strike out in the game of baseball.
It’s a truism known well to former Minnesota Twins’ player Al Newman, who learned never to take any success for granted.
Newman, who is now a St. Joseph resident, was the keynote speaker May 5 at a leadership conference sponsored by the Sartell Area Chamber of Commerce at The Waters church. He held the audience spellbound with fascinating and sometimes hilarious anecdotes from his long career in baseball.
As a member of the Twins, Newman was a world champion, not once but twice, when the Twins won the World Series in 1987 and in 1991. And Newman, more than most people, knows how such dizzying heights of greatness should never go to one’s head.
“Let failure be part of your success story,” Newman advised.
For many years, Newman played in the minor leagues, daring to dream that one day his chance just might come – a call to play in the major league. When the call did come, he didn’t believe it.
He was staying at a hotel at the time. He answered the phone. It was a man saying something about wanting Newman to play for the Montreal Expos. He thought it was a buddy, messing with his mind.
“Stop fooling around,” he said and hung up.
Later there was a knock on his hotel-room door.
“If you don’t want to be in the big leagues, I’ll get somebody else,” the guy told Newman, who turned speechless.
The next day, Newman found himself on a flight to Philadelphia for a game. As he entered the ballpark, a certain panic took over.
“I was scared to death,” he said.
Life in baseball is fraught with anxieties.
“It takes two or three years before you think you’re comfortable,” he said.
In the “old” days, baseball was broadcast about once a week on TV, Newman noted. It just wasn’t ever-present and so accessible as today. As a result, if a ball player messed up or didn’t perform well, the failings made the news big-time. It was easy for insecurities to take hold. In Hollywood, they say you’re only as good as your last picture. The same could be said of baseball – only as good as your last season, your last game.
Newman recalled how he, a couple other players and Twins’ manager Tom Kelly enjoyed playing card games at ball fields in early afternoons. During that time for relaxation, they would sometimes read fan mail. Newman read a letter from a woman who wrote that on Newman’s birthday she bought two tickets to an upcoming game for the pleasure of watching Newman play.
“Which game?” Kelly asked Newman.
“The one on June 3,” he answered.
“But will you still be here June 3?” Kelly rather mischievously asked, yet another reminder that being a member of a baseball team can suddenly end.
However, despite the anxieties and occasional insecurities, Newman loved and still loves baseball, which is a part of his very soul.
He vividly recalled his first trip to a baseball stadium when he was a boy in Kansas City, Mo. He was eager to watch the Kansas City Athletics play ball.
“I walked in and saw the greenest, greenest grass I ever saw in my life,” he recalled with awe still in his voice.
Then, across the field he saw what looked like a rabbit’s wicker basket. He saw a player lean toward the basket and expected him to pull a rabbit out. Instead, the player lifted a baseball out of the basket.
“It was so white, the whitest baseball,” he said, recalling the magic moment as if a rabbit had suddenly become a baseball. “And that was it; I was hooked.”
Newman loves to share his love of baseball, especially with young people. He is assistant coach for the St. Cloud Rox baseball team, which is a member of the Northwoods League, and he is also an instructor at Acceleration Baseball in St. Cloud.
Training players, to Newman, is a “daily joy.” He loves to see young people – boys and girls – develop and strengthen baseball skills – especially the all-important hand-eye coordination.
He loves to see their dedication and determination when they hit the ball, field the ball as they eventually acquire “an amazing feeling of accomplishment.”
Now, more than ever, baseball is a global sport, Newman noted.
“It includes the whole world,” he said.
Life in baseball
Born in Kansas City, Newman, now 56, had the rare honor of helping the Minnesota Twins win two World Series. He was with the team from 1987 to 1991.
Previously he played for the Montreal Expos (1985-1986) and, after his years with the Twins, he played for the Texas Rangers (1992).
From 1979-1982, Newman studied accounting at San Diego State University where he played baseball for famed coach Jim Dietz. He was also a football player at the school.
Although he had major-league offers, Newman turned them down during his college years for one reason or another.
After college, he spent four years playing in the minor leagues.
Newman usually was a second baseman, but he also served as a shortstop, third baseman and left fielder at various times in his career. Newman is a switch-hitter who throws with his right hand.
The high point came in 1989 when Newman had 113 hits, 19 doubles, 38 runs-batted-in, 62 runs and 25 stolen bases.
After his time in the major leagues, in 2008 Newman founded Newmie Rewards LLC, a business to help raise funds for sports teams. That same year, he was host of a radio show in Minneapolis, The Al Newman Show. Throughout his entire career, he has worked tirelessly for development of youth baseball, and it’s a job he is still doing and one he says he still loves.