Always Humble and Accessible, Terry Ryan Deserving of Hall of Fame Honor

Did you know? Rick Stelmaszek made his MLB debut at age 22 in 1971 for the Washington Senators. He played in six games and went 0-for-9. His manager knew a little something about hitting, however, Ted Williams was not known to be a good coach. 

“Stelly” returned to the big leagues in 1973 playing seven games with the Rangers and then 22 games for the Angels. He played in 25 games for the 1974 Cubs. He continued to play in the minor leagues until 1978, when he finished with 23 games for Wisconsin Rapids, the Low-A affiliate of the Twins. He was a player-manager that year, and remained the team’s manager for three years. In 1981, he joined the Twins big-league staff and remained with the team through the 2012 season.

Stelmaszek and Ryan are the 39th and 40th members of the Twins Hall of Fame. They will be inducted on Saturday, Aug. 10.

Did you know that Terry Ryan had one of the more impressive pitching seasons by a Twins relief pitcher in the minor leagues?

Ryan was a 19-year-old during the 1973 season. He had been drafted by the Twins out of his Janesville, Wis. high school in 1972. The southpaw worked in 43 games that season, all out of the bullpen. He went 10-0 and had 13 saves. He posted a 1.78 ERA and 1.11 WHIP. In 81 innings, he had 55 strikeouts and 27 walks. 

Obviously the goals for pitchers 50 years ago were a little different than they are now. A pitcher’s job was to simply get outs, and ideally get those outs as quickly as possible so that they could get more innings. Not that pitch counts were a thing then. And batters didn’t want to strikeout either. 

Unfortunately, he had arm issues after that season. He spent 1974-1976 at Double-A Orlando he was never able to replicate that success. In fact, in 57 innings over those three seasons, he walked 29 and struck out 24 batters. 

Think there is a reason that Ryan liked signing strike-throwers?

Ryan went to the University of Wisconsin and earned his degree. In 1980, the Mets hired him to be an area scout. He spent six years with that organization. That’s when the Twins hired him as their Scouting Director before the 1987 season. Late in the 1994 season, Andy MacPhail left the Twins to join the Cubs. In September, Ryan was named the Twins GM. 

Highlights

• 8/29/96: Traded Dave Hollins to the Mariners for David Ortiz. 
• 8/20/97: Traded Roberto Kelly to the Mariners for Joe Mays. 
• 2/16/98: Traded a disgruntled Chuck Knoblauch to the Yankees for four players including Cristian Guzman and Eric Milton. 
• 5/21/99: Traded Rick Aguilera to the Red Sox for Kyle Lohse. 
• 12/13/99: Traded Rule 5 pick Jared Camp to the Marlins for Johan Santana. 
• 9/9/00: Traded Hector Carrasco to the Red Sox for Lew Ford. 
• 7/12/02: Traded Brian Buchanan to the Padres for Jason Bartlett. 
• 11/14/03: Traded A.J. Pierzynski for Joe Nathan, Francisco Liriano, and Boof Bonser. 

In mid-September of 2007, Ryan announced that he was stepping down as GM of the Twins. He remained in the organization in an advisory role, but Bill Smith took over as GM. 

Four years later, Smith was fired - er, re-assigned - and Ryan slid back into the role of GM. Just before spring training in 2014, Ryan announced that he had cancer and was receiving treatment. He missed spring training, but soon after was back at full strength and back on the job. 

In mid-July of 2016, Ryan was fired as GM. Long-time assistant Rob Antony took the job on an interim basis. Following the season, Ryan was again hired by Andy MacPhail, who was the Phillies president of baseball operations. He remains in the Phillies organization but continues to call the Twin Cities his home. 

I’ve been a Twins fan since the early-to-mid-80s to at least some degree. Aside from names and faces on baseball cards, it was Kirby Puckett’s debut that really got me to the point where I was reading the newspaper most days (I was 8-9. Let’s be honest, I wasn’t reading the paper too much). 

I remember the 1987 World Series well. I was in 7th grade and remember it well. Consider that I started this blogging thing in May of 2004. Terry Ryan had his hands on a lot of what was going on with the Twins through all of those years. By then, I started caring about what a Scouting Director was, and what the GM does, and having thoughts on trades and signings. Terry Ryan was involved in all of that. 

In 2010, I went to watch the Twins Low-A affiliate which was in Beloit, Wisconsin, at that time. My memories from that first trip included seeing Brian Dozier start a game at shortstop. That night, he learned he was being promoted to Fort Myers, and the next day, Danny Santana was at shortstop (and I want to say he went 0-for-4 with three strikeouts and a couple of errors). Angel Morales, a tremendously athletic outfielder from Puerto Rico, got hit in the helmet with a fastball. I met Sir Tom Stuifbergen, WBC hero for The Netherlands! Pohlman Field was not great, but it was charming. 

At one point, I was using the men’s restroom underneath the bleachers. Standing there, I look to my right, and there is Mike Trout in uniform. Trout was playing with the Cedar Rapids Kernels that year. A year later, he made his MLB debut. 

It began my annual trip to the Twins Low-A affiliate. I made three or four trips to Beloit, and the Twins have been in Cedar Rapids since 2013 (and moved to High-A in 2021). 

The second year I was there, I was there for a three or four-day weekend. I got to the ballpark really early each day to watch the Snappers take infield and batting practice. Each day, Terry Ryan was also there, sitting in the bleachers on the opposite side of the grandstand. 

After the third game, Ryan approached me, shook my hand, and said, “Seth, I’m Terry Ryan with the Twins.” I was kind of in awe. Yes, Mr. Ryan. I am fully aware of who you are. I don’t remember if those words actually came out of my mouth or not. 

He said, “Why didn’t you come up and talk to me?” My response? “Well, I guess I look at it this way. I’m here to enjoy the game and learn about these players I write about. You’re working. I wouldn't want to interrupt you while you’re working.” 

We went on to chat. He said, “You’re from Perham, right? Do you know…?” 

When I attend spring training, I prefer to spend most of my time down on the minor-league fields, watching the prospects work or play games. 

If you were there throughout the day, you could count on seeing two people back there. Mike Radcliff could be seen observing the back fields unless he was out scouting a college or high school game. If the Twins weren’t playing a road game that day, you could count on Terry Ryan being back there. 

I’d talk to Ryan from time to time. Often we might be in the same general area. Other Twins fans would go up and talk to him, ask him questions, etc. There were several times that Ryan would get a question about if a guy had been practicing that day or how he was looking, and Ryan would point to me and say, “But he would know. Hey Seth, did (Player X) throw a bullpen this morning?” 

I always thought that was funny. Knowing Ryan and his work ethic, there was nothing that happened that he wasn’t at least aware of. I think he liked to hand over some credit, or maybe he was trying to get out of a conversation. 

Some of those mid-to-late March days at spring training can be draining. It may be 80 degrees and incredibly humid at 8:00 am. And then it can be 97 degrees and just as humid at 2:00 pm. 

When I’ve been there, I try to be on the back fields by about 9:00 or 9:30 as the players begin to come out to start their stretch. Hitters typically stretch, run, take tons of ground balls, fly balls, or pop ups, take some batting practice (while often continuing to work on defense), and sprinkle in time in the weight room. The pitchers do their stretching, get some running in, do their bullpens on appropriate days, and do daily PFPs (Pitcher Fielding Practice) ad nauseam. They get through a full workout and practice by about noon. They run in for a quick lunch, and then at 1:00, they will play games until 3:30 or 4:00. 

Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t run between fields, but I will walk between the five or six back fields, camera around my neck and strategic cargo shorts holding a cell phone, keys, several pieces of paper, a couple of writing utensils, a wallet, a couple of tater tots and a smoothie. 

Again, Terry Ryan prioritized spending a lot of time on those same back fields, observing, talking to players, coaches, etc.

One particularly hot and humid day, I was at the ballpark from 9:00 until 4:00. I shuffled over to my rental car in the parking lot and started it, cranking up the air conditioning. I looked up, and Terry Ryan was running foul poles on the warning track of Stelmaszek Field (the entire field just outside of Hammond Stadium). 

Thankfully the car was getting cooler because I was in awe. While I sat there, he did at least eight back-and-forths. My jaw dropped; I was also trying to do the math. On a field with dimensions of 330 feet down the lines and 400 to center field, how far is it from one foul pole to the other (and for ‘simplicity,’ we’ll assume that Ryan was running right against the fence.)? Once I came up with that answer, I multiplied it by 16 (8 back-and-forths) to determine how far Mr. Ryan had run. The answer? I don’t know. I was only a math minor, and I struggled to get that! 

Satisfied with that answer, I left. Ryan kept jogging. I don’t know how long he kept jogging, or how far that meant he jogged. I know that on my drive back to the rental place I was staying at, I went through a Wendy’s drive-thru and ordered two Frosty’s. One chocolate and one vanilla. You know, so that the person handing them to me through the window would assume that one of them would be consumed by a second person. 

Every writer who spent time with Terry Ryan will mention that they loved that he would sit at a lunch table with the writers and answer their questions. Good questions. Dumb questions. Often, questions that were asked nearly every day. But he took that time because he understood that the writers have a job to do, and he could help them with some background information and quotes. 

One day before a spring training game, I sat at a table in the Hammond Stadium lunch room with five or six other Twins beat writers and Terry Ryan. The GM looked at me and said, “Seth, why don’t you start us out today? Do you have any questions for me? I’m tired of answering the same questions from these others.”

I was ready. I said, “Yeah, I was talking to (minor-league invite) Tyler Grimes this morning. He said that when you called him last month and invited him to spring training, he said he would think about it and call you back. Have you ever received that response from a minor leaguer when you invited them to spring training?” 

He (and the other writers) started pointing out how that was definitely a different question than he typically received first. Ryan acknowledged, “Caught me off guard. I can tell you that!” 

And here is that Tyler Grimes article. 

Before a game at Target Field, Ryan held his pregame chat with writers at a big round table. When it was done, somehow, he and I were the last ones to go to the lunch room. When we had our plates, the round table was full. Ryan looked at me and said, “Seth, why don’t you join me over here.” We walked over to an empty table and enjoyed the pregame meal, chatting about baseball and non-baseball topics. 

Hopefully you enjoyed some of those stories. I’m not a great storyteller, but I liked that Terry Ryan made the effort to ensure I felt comfortable. 

Terry Ryan is a scout by nature. He knows the job of going to all the corners of the earth to find the players that could become great. He understood the grind. And while in baseball, those first-round types or bonus players will get extra time often, Ryan made sure every player on every roster felt important and had some chance. If they kept producing, they would keep getting opportunities. 

I feel like Ryan appreciated that I spent time covering all levels of the organization, from the big leagues to the lowest levels of the minor leagues. I think he appreciated Q&As done with top prospects or recent draft picks. 

For instance, 2015 was the 30th anniversary of The Klaw. Tom Klawitter was a left-handed pitcher given very little chance to make the Twins’ roster. However, he had an excellent spring training and made manager Billy Gardner’s opening-day roster. When Gardner would walk to the mound and call on Klawitter to come into the game, he put up his left hand to signal The Claw (look up Baron von Raschke). 

Klawitter has lived, taught, and coached in Janesville, Wisconsin, for over 35 years and over time has developed a great relationship with Terry Ryan. Of the Twins executive, he said, “I’ve got a good connection with Terry Ryan. He’s a friend of mine. One of the best men I have ever met. He’s just got it. He understands how to deal with people. He is a true baseball man and loves this game.”  (Klawitter Article Part 1) (Klawitter Article Part 2) 

Ryan never seemed to enjoy talking about himself or his career, but he did enjoy crediting others. He often would give Mike Radcliff credit for a signing or a draft pick. Radcliff was the same. He wanted to give all credit to the area scout. When I reached out for a quote on Klawitter, he responded quickly and thoughtfully. 

Sometime in 2019, a couple of years after his time with the Twins was over, I walked into the press box a couple of hours before game time. Terry Ryan called me over as I walked to my seat and started removing my laptop. I walked over there. First, he asked me if I knew this other person from Perham that he knew. Then he asked me when I would post my Top 50 Twins Prospect rankings. He’d been checking the site daily to see it. 

If you want to question how successful Terry Ryan’s tenure with the Twins (from 1986 through 2016) was, that is totally fine. He made a lot of good trades, and like every GM, he didn’t get them all right. He put together some very strong rosters in the 2002 through 2010 range. Those teams had solid rosters but could not come through in the playoffs. 

Ryan once told me he didn’t expect writers, bloggers or radio voices to always be positive. He admitted that the team had given us plenty of reasons to be disappointed. All he asked was that the writing would be fair and factual. That stuck with me. Not that I ever wrote non-factual opinion articles that got personal. Still, it is a good reminder that if you write something publicly (in a newspaper, on a website, or social media), it needs to be factual. 

Congratulations to Terry Ryan, his family, and the Stelmaszek family on the well-deserved honor of being named Twins Hall of Famers.