Dukes power surge is smooth as Butter Pagan
Never before has Felix (Butter) Pagan had a weekend like that. Not coincidentally, the Duluth-Superior Dukes have never before had a weekend like that, either.
The Dukes pulled off their first-ever sweep of a three-game series at St. Paul, beating the Saints 8-7, 13-9 in 12 innings, and 14-3. With four straight victories and eight of the last 10, the Dukes have climbed into a three-way tie for first place with St. Paul and Schaumburg in the Northern League’s East division. They head for Winnipeg and another three-game series before coming home for six games, starting Friday.
Pagan stunned three straight capacity crowds in St. Paul by hammering four home runs in three games, giving him seven homers for the season. Not bad, for a home run hitter, but incredible for Felix Pagan, who hit seven home runs all of last season at Fort Wayne in the Midwest League, and nine home runs for Tennessee in the Appalachian League two seasons ago.
Pagan, a Puerto Rican, apparently doesn’t do singles anymore. He used to be a singles and doubles hitter, but he had four home runs and two doubles against the Saints, and he drove in eight runs in the three games against the Saints.
“I’ve never had a weekend like that,” Pagan said. “That was the first time I’ve ever hit four home runs in one weekend. I’ve always been a singles and doubles hitter.”
He looks too slim to be a power hitter, but he has a powerful but fluid swing — smooth as butter, which just happens to be his nickname. He is not, however, called Butter because of his batting swing but because his last name is pronounced “pa-GAN,” which closely resembles “pecan,” so a couple of years ago, somebody who likes ice cream started calling him “Butter Pagan.”
Pagan’s slim facial features and wiry upper body elicits estimates of, maybe, 160 pounds, tops. But he insists he weighs 180. “People always tell me I look lighter than 180,” Pagan laughed.
That slim appearance, plus batting seventh in the Dukes order, may have made Pagan look like a soft touch to the St. Paul Saints last weekend. In fact, the Dukes themselves may have been seen as the elixir to cure a four-game St. Paul losing streak.
But in the first game, the Dukes rallied from a 3-0 deficit and won 8-7, as Bryan Warner, Anthony Lewis and Pagan all swatted home runs for the Dukes. In the second game, Lewis and Sean Mulligan hit home runs, and then Pagan hit another one in the ninth inning, which helped get the teams into extra innings, where the Dukes won 13-9 with a four-run 12th. On Sunday, Pagan smacked two more home runs as the Dukes broke to a 7-0 lead and cruised to the pivotal victory.
“You don’t need to be big to hit home runs,” Pagan said. “You just need to be patient and put a good swing on it. I’m not looking for home runs, I’m just trying to be patient and wait for my pitch. If they throw me my pitch, that’s their fault, not my fault. Three of those four home runs were on fastballs, but the one I hit over the center field wall was a slider.”
Pagan had hoped to play in the Twin Cities, but across the river in the Metrodome.
“I used to play third base, and then second base, and the Minnesota Twins signed me as a second baseman,” Pagan said. “Then, the Twins said they wanted me to be a utility player, so I started playing outfield. I hit .291 my first year, and .275 the second.
“My contract with the Twins was up this year, and I started at Fort Myers in the Florida State League. I played something like 10 games there, and all of a sudden they said I was released. I don’t know why, no idea. They just said, ‘Sorry, we just got a letter, and you’ve been released.’
“I didn’t know what to do. I went back home to Puerto Rico.”
Meanwhile, a few thousand miles north, Larry See was getting ready for his first year of coaching with the Dukes. As training camp neared, See developed a routine of going home and checking all the faxes with all the names of every available player.
“I saw his name on the list,” said See, “and I looked up his stats and saw that he hit mostly doubles. So I gave him a call.”
The call came a week before camp, and Pagan, who had never ventured as far north as Duluth, jumped at the chance. He admits that he likes the temperature to be 85 or above, but said he’s adjusted to those Duluth nights when the wind comes in off Lake Superior and you might have to add two days’ temperatures together to reach 85.
“It’s not so bad,” Pagan said. “When the wind comes off the lake, it’s an advantage for the pitchers, because the hitters can’t swing the bats in the cold.”
But going into the Winnipeg series, the Dukes bats are sizzling. Pagan is hitting .310, but that’s only good for fourth on the team behind Brandon Evans (.384), Bryan Warner (.331), and Erick Corps (.313). And the temperature is supposed to warm up for this weekend.
Even humanitarian gestures must follow rules
Clem Haskins is a stern father-figure of a basketball coach, and, from all indications, a warm and wonderful humanitarian.
At his Kentucky residence, according to news reports, he helps poor, black families out by providing a major appliance here, or a place to live there. There are families living on his property, reports say, that are there rent-free, provided they maintain the property.
As basketball coach at the University of Minnesota, Clem fought hard and well to provide scholarship opportunities, particularly for less-fortunate prospects. He lobbied to prevent higher academic standards for entrance, and went so far as to say they were racially discriminatory. Clem was wrong. Higher academic standards are discriminatory, but against substandard students. That’s what college is for. Those who can’t do the work, shouldn’t go.
If we are to believe the most serious allegations that forced Clem Haskins to leave Minnesota, then he may have slipped a little money to some of his players who needed it. We know that he arranged the splintered counseling structure that gave his basketball players focused counselors. That system led to the situation where Jan Ganglehoff, and others, wrote papers and did homework for basketball players in the enormous academic fraud case currently being investigated.
Blind loyalty has led some boosters to blame the tutors for doing the work, as if it was done by them spontaneously and without Clem’s knowledge, to say nothing of design. Absurd. We can believe that Clem wouldn’t order it specifically, but perhaps assistants and/or aides were advised to do whatever was necessar to make sure the players stay eligible.
If Clem was responsible for these things, and we must assume he was, then I believe he either executed or ordered them for the same type of humanitarian reasons evident to the folks back in Kentucky, who need Clem’s generosity to have a chance to improve their station in life. A degree, no matter how gained, clearly will give some of those marginal athletes a better chance at a future.
The only problem at Minnesota was, Clem’s well-intentioned generosity and humanity ran outside of the NCAA’s stringent rules.
Just a couple of months ago, Doug Woog was forced to resign as hockey coach at Minnesota, too.
I can recall attending the funeral of Jake Woog, Doug’s dad, a couple of years ago. Doug spoke lovingly of how everybody liked Jake, who owned a bowling alley and bar. He told of how, when he was young, sometimes the family went without, but Jake would slip a few bucks to a young man going out on a date if he thought he needed it. And if some young men were having a beer in his place, he might let an underage kid have a beer too, just so he wouldn’t feel left out. Those people appreciated Jake’s kindness and generosity, and he was liked and admired by all.
Interesting parallel, then, that among those few allegations that Minnesota’s in-house investigation discovered were that Doug gave a player some money, illegally. And that he bought beer for the players, sometimes cases of it for the busride home on road trips.
I believe that Doug, in his earnest hope to be well-liked by his players, may have done some of those things to approximate what his father had done for other young men.
But, again, these things were directly in conflict with NCAA rules. Somehow, Doug got off track, and his treatment of some players eroded until it led to serious complaints, and his ultimate dismissal, which was cloaked as a resignation.
Whatever, the University of Minnesota now replaces two of its highest-profile coaches for clearcut and obvious reasons. The boosters, including those in the media, will whine that this sort of thing happens at every Division I institution. I don’t buy that. I don’t believe that all major colleges operate outside the rules, and that Minnesota’s athletic officials were the only ones blatant enough to be caught.
I believe that McKinley Boston, who oversees the administration of activities that include athletics, is an honorable man of great strength and character, but some of the people he trusted don’t share those attributes.
We can only wait and see what happens to those in supervisory roles who have been linked by evidence of involvement. What may have started out as a couple of little attempts to stretch the rules here and there, for what might have seemed humanitarian or good-guy reasons, clearly spread and grew and worsened until illegal behavior became acceptable. Those most obviously responsible may be gone now, but at least they might have had humanitarian reasons for some of their actions. But what about those in administrative positions assigned to oversee the purity of athletics? Those administrators, especially those who insist that they were unaware of such widespread problems, are possibly the most guilty of all.
TrueRide solves new-age skateboard nuisance
[cutline stuff—
#1: Teenagers flock to the new “SweetRoll” skateboard park, installed by TrueRide, adjacent to the Shoreview Community Center.
#2: Dave Benson checks out new Quarter-pipes at TrueRide’s shop just east of Duluth. ]
Every city has ’em, teenagers with skateboards who seem to always be in the way at shopping centers, on sidewalks and in every public place with room to maneuver on their boards. To a lot of adults, those skateboarders are somewhee between a hazard and a nuisance, if not both.
How you gonna solve the problem? Who you gonna call? No, not Ghostbusters.
In this case, you put in a call to TrueRide, Inc., a new and flourishing business on the eastern outskirts of Duluth. TrueRide builds self-contained skateboard parks for cities and suburbs all over the country, and as far away as Japan. Duluth hasn’t taken advantage of its year-old hometown business yet, although TrueRide is working on plans for Cloquet and Hibbing, with Superior a potential future customer.
One of the neatest success stories is from the northern Twin Cities suburb of Shoreview, where three went to a Shoreview City Council meeting to petition for the building of some sort of facility where they could perform their skateboarding tricks. The easy way out would have been to write these kids off as problems. But Jerry Haffeman, Shoreview’s director of parks and recreation, chose to put the kids to work on the problem.
“Everybody has got the same problem,” said Haffeman. “These skateboarders and in-line skaters are everywhere, and we wanted to find a way to get ’em to stop running over seniors in our Community Center. So we talked it over with the three boys, and gave them some time to put together a plan. We had gotten a similar request from a skateboarder who was in the process of becoming an Eagle scout, so we worked with him to put together a focus group for his Eagle scout project. The kids did a real thorough job.”
Most communities might have simply put up more signs banning skateboarders and in-line skaters, but the research led Haffeman to TrueRide, Inc., owned by brothers Dave and Greg Benson and their partner, Tony Ciardelli.
“We all were from Bloomington, and we’ve all worked for companies involved with skateboarding and in-line skating,” said Dave Benson, who said the three traveled the country, putting on displays and setting up demonstrations, including helping set up ESPN’s ‘3Bs’ — Bike, Board and Blades.
But they grew weary of setting up and tearing down so many temporary facilities. “Being on the road for 80 days straight, we got burned out,” Benson said. “In 1997, we decided we could make a business out of building permanent parks for skateboarding.”
They moved their business last summer from the Twin Cities suburb of Hamel to a deserted and former missile site, a mile up Berquist Rd. from the I35 expressway.
“My brother and I came up to UMD to go to college in 1989,” Benson said. “We liked the Duluth area so much, we stayed here and bought homes. When we started our business in the Twin Cities, we had to move back down there and rent out our places up here. But we wanted to move back up here because we love the area. I enjoy fishing, camping and going to the Boundary Waters, and being in Minneapolis meant traffic, people and all that. So we found a shop up here for one-third of what it cost us in the Twin Cities.”
There are about a dozen ramp-building businesses in the country with reputations for quality work, but Benson said TrueSports’ owners, and their four employees, are dedicated to make sure nobody beats their quality or craftsmanship. All-wood ramps, made out of the best marine-tech plywood, and environmentally friendly ACQ pressure-treated plywood are covered with Skatelite surfaces of a combined plastic and wood composition. Paying premium prices for the best material will bring solid reviews and enhance the company’s already-solid reputation, Benson said.
“We build our own templates so we can make the curves and transitions just right so that beginners can do them, but experts can enjoy them, too,” said Benson. “It’s not rocket science, but we build them from the skaters’ perspective.”
For $25,000, which is less than the cost to develop a conventional playground, TrueRide completed a Tier I facility two weeks ago, adjacent to the multipurpose Community Center in Shoreview, just a long kick from a soccer field farther to the east, or a strong throw from a softball field to the north. Tier I means no jump or ramp can be more than 3 feet high, which means the facility gets a break on insurance, and requires no waivers, equipment or constant supervision, although Shoreview recommends helmets and may start renting them. Shoreview’s facility consists of a 3-foot Mini (ramp), a 3-foot Quarter-pipe, a 3-foot Spine, a 20-foot long Rail, and a 3-foot Wedge.
Pick a morning, any morning, and you can find dozens of kids working out on the odd-shaped structures — bothering nobody and entertaining themselves for hours on end. “The morning after we opened it, I got here at 8 a.m. and there were nine kids with two mothers already out there,” said Haffeman. “Two of them were little girls, wearing full armor. It’s free and unsupervised, a lot like ballfields used to be — just a place for kids to come and do things.”
The progressive thinking of Haffeman, plus the quality work by TrueRide, turned a potential youth problem into a multi-faceted success.
“Kids get a bad rap and a lot of negative reaction,” said Dave Benson. “Some kids don’t have any money, and a Tier I park like we built in Shoreview lets kids come in and do their thing for six hours, for free.
“We started out in this business with two portable parks that we moved around to Robbinsdale, Maple Grove, Golden Valley, Crystal and New Hope last summer. We did it so we could show those cities what skateboarding and in-line skating was all about. It was a lot of work, and all those cities wanted us to do it again this summer. But we’ve decided to focus on permanent parks.
“The one we’ve done at Shoreview gives us 15 permanent parks in place now. We’ve got them in Georgia, Kansas, Toledo, Ohio, and at an Air Force base in Yokota, Japan. We’ve done five more this spring, with parks in San Antonio, Texas, Seymour, Conn., Club Med in Florida, Lake in the Hills, Ill., and we’re just finishing one of the biggest ones in Grayslake, Ill.”
TrueRide also is working on another permanent facility in Maple Grove. The highly successful John Rose Speedskating Oval in Roseville also has TrueRide equipment set up for summertime use. That is a more sophisticated Tier II facility, with ramps and jumps up to 6 feet high, and it requires supervision and full protective gear.
Business has kept the TrueRide staff hopping from actual construction to trips to promote and set up their devices. They had to turn down an offer to set up a facility for NBC’s Gravity Games because they didn’t have time.
Benson said he’d love to see TrueRide build a facility in Duluth, somewhere like a waterfront site just west of the DECC.
Meanwhile, in the facility on Berquist Rd., there is a badge for the success of TrueSports. It is a sign hanging on a post shows a skateboard with a diagonal line slashing through it, meaning “No Skateboarding.” The sign was presented to TrueRide by the City of Roseville, which doesn’t need it anymore, since TrueRide’s facility provided a wholesome haven for skateboarders.
Borders returns to Duluth to face Dukes
As a drawing card for fans, Ila Borders will be facing her biggest challenge when she starts on the mound for Madison against the Duluth-Superior Dukes Saturday night in Wade Municipal Stadium. Not only will Borders be facing the Dukes, her former team, but she will be taking on Bob Dylan, Paul Simon and the BoDeans.
Borders was unaware that Dylan, Simon and the BoDeans are performing in a huge outdoor concert next to the DECC, which could draw 20,000 fans as possibly the largest event in the city’s history at the same time as the Black Wolf face the Dukes. Then, of course, Borders typically doesn’t want to be considered a special attraction anyway.
“The weird thing about coming back to pitch in Duluth is that I don’t feel like there is anything weird about it,” said Borders, while with the team as it faced the St. Paul Saints in a midweek series, before the Friday-Saturday-Sunday series that kicks off a six-game Dukes homestand.
“I enjoyed my time in Duluth, and the crowds were always good, but to me, my chance to start against the Dukes is just a normal baseball game.”
Borders, who made news as the first female to pitch in a pro baseball league in brief appearances with the Saints two years ago before being traded to the Dukes, attracted national media attention last season when she became the first female starting pitcher in a men’s pro league. She she had several strong starts for the Dukes, whose attendance was noticeably increased every time she was scheduled to start.
While Dukes fans supported her warmly with virtually every successful pitch, she hated the celebrity of being considered a novelty, and still does. When the Dukes let her go to Madison at the start of this season, she said she wasn’t bitter, but accepted the move and has enjoyed her season so far.
“It’s been great playing for Madison, and I love the city of Madison,” said Borders, a left-hander who makes up for a lack of outright velocity with clever placement and variety. “The media hasn’t done any big things on me in there, which is just the way I like it.
“Even when I was with the Dukes, I enjoyed going to Madison. I’m a city person, growing up living in downtown Los Angeles, and the great thing about Madison is you can enjoy the city, or you can go 15 minutes away and be away from it. If it wasn’t for the winters, I’d probably live in Madison.”
While she was into her second season with the Dukes before she got a chance to start, Borders said she is well satisfied with the way she has been deployed by the Madison club.
“Al Gallagher is the best manager I’ve ever played for — I love the way he manages,” she said. “He puts me in there in the right situations and I always know my role. Sometimes I’ve been used in relief, maybe coming in against left-handed hitters, but I’ve gotten to start, too. But when I’m in the bullpen, I always know exactly what’s expected of me.”
In three starts, Borders did her best in her most recent outing, a three-inning scoreless stint against Schaumberg. It hasn’t always been that successful, and sometimes it’s been frustrating.
“I had one start against Fargo, and after I faced two hitters, we got rained out,” she said.
As for returning to Duluth, the potential of drawing a big crowd, or going against the biggest concert — if not the largest single function — in city history, has no impact on her. She also said she doesn’t think Dukes management overlooked her fan-appeal when they let her go.
“The crowds always treated me well in Duluth, but the fans all over the league have always treated me pretty decent,” said Borders, who didn’t see herself as any special attraction with the Dukes. “Management only cares about winning, not drawing fans, and that’s the way it should be.”
Maybe. But there are still bills to pay, and despite Borders’ refreshingly candid view, it would be interesting to quiz the Dukes management as to whether they’d prefer to be undefeated and draw 1,000 fans a game, or win one-third of their games but draw 3,000 fans for each game.
From that standpoint, maybe the Dukes are the ones with the biggest challenge in facing one adopted hometown returnee in Borders at the same time as facing the attraction of that “other” hometown hero, Bob Dylan.
Racing Sizzler set for Proctor Wednesday
The weather forecast for this weekend indicates we may be in for a sizzler Up North. As far as Proctor Speedway is concerned, however, the sizzler will be next Wednesday — the third annual North Star Summer Sizzler.
That will be the second in the Amzoil-sponsored series of races shared by Proctor and the Superior Speedway, and should attract 40 top Late Model stock cars to Proctor’s dirt oval.
While the Fourth of July is traditionally a big weekend for motorsports nationally, none of the Up North tracks are scheduling anything extraordinary for this weekend. Regular shows will be conducted at Superior and Grand Rapids Friday night, at Hibbing and Ashland Saturday night, and at Proctor Sunday night.
“The only difference we’ll have is that we’ll start an hour early — at 5 p.m. rather than 6 p.m. — to let our fans get away and see the fireworks in Duluth,” said Chris Sailstad, vice president of Proctor’s operation.
Cedar Lake, Wis., may lure some of the usual Hibbing racers with a big purse for Saturday night’s Firecracker 100 Late Model show, although season points may cause most of them to stay in Hibbing. With large-scale specials scheduled at other times during the summer, the Up North tracks avoid them on the big holiday weekend. That’s just as well for Proctor, which had the first Amzoil Special race set for Memorial Day weekend, but got rained out. The second of the series then became the first, at Superior, and a strong event was held there, with Steve Larson of Cumberland, Wis., winning, Mitch Johnson of Fargo second and Joel Cryderman of Thunder Bay third in the rich Late Model event.
That should guarantee a big show for Proctor on Wednesday.
Ashland, meanwhile, will hold its big special on July 30-31, with Wissota Late Models on July 30, and Street Stocks and Modifieds qualifying on Friday, July 30 and running features on Saturday, July 31.
About the Author
John Gilbert is a lifetime Minnesotan and career journalist, specializing in cars and sports during and since spending 30 years at the Minneapolis Tribune, now the Star Tribune. More recently, he has continued translating the high-tech world of autos and sharing his passionate insights as a freelance writer/photographer/broadcaster. A member of the prestigious North American Car and Truck of the Year jury since 1993. John can be heard Monday-Friday from 9-11am on 610 KDAL(www.kdal610.com) on the "John Gilbert Show," and writes a column in the Duluth Reader.
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