Star Tribune from Minneapolis, Minnesota • Page 44

PAGE C12 STAR TRIBUNE SUNDAY, JULY 19 1998 "'I 'm TTP" rsoesot an adju 4 t-i. 2 Mike Restovich has displayed plenty of potential during first full year of pro ball. WELCOME TOE-TOWN to 1 im in ,1 fj 1 ie minors -Mi MP ljfe Mike Restovlch, a former Rochester Mayo High School star, stretches out In the clubhouse with trainer Tony Leo before a game, said. "There never will be another like him." Dugger, 69, recently had a golf cart fall on him, breaking his hip. That's cut down on his golf, but not his presence at Twins games.

"I just keep going," he said. E-TOWNromCl Rookie-league ballpark in Tennessee is filled with service and character 1 "3 1 Mike Restovich, the Twins' second-round draft pick last year, leans on bat boy Ronnie Hendry of Elizabethton while shagging balls during batting practice. Restovich concentrated more on playing basketball than baseball while attending Rochester Mayo. By Jim Souhan Star Tribune Staff Writer ELIZABETHTON, TENN. When Mike Restovich was growing up in Rochester, he would play one-on-one baseball against his older brother in the backyard.

His brother, George, insisted on pretending he was a Twin. Mike had to be a Tiger. Years later, the Tigers drafted George, and the Twins drafted Mike. "Strange, how that happened," Mike Restovich said. These days George, having decided a promising baseball career was not as secure a future as an attorney's, is attending law school in St.

Louis. Mike, the Twins' second-round draft pick last year, is studying in baseball's school of hard knocks the Appalachian League. "I played with my brother last summer for a couple of weeks, until I broke my wrist," Restovich said. "That was one of my biggest thrills in baseball, to play with him." Restovich admits he hasn't had many career highlights. He looks more like a power forward than a power hitter, and he concentrated on basketball at Rochester Mayo.

"High school baseball in Minnesota really isn't that big a deal," he said. "Baseball really only lasts a couple of months in Minnesota, and half the games are canceled. I really haven't played that much baseball in my life." Which is why Restovich is both a raw and undeniable talent. After playing third base in high school, he's being converted to right field at rookie-league Elizabethton. He's considered a "five-tool" player, meaning he should be able to hit for average and power, run, field and throw.

After a batting-practice session in which he pounded balls far over the fence at Joe O'Brien Field, Twins minor league fields coordinator Larry Corrigan said: "That was un be lievable. Hitting them out to left field isn't that big a deal here, but anyone who can backspin the ball over the 414 sign in center is doing something." Restovich is batting .357 with five homers and 31 RBI since Elizabethton's season started in mid-June. He has a strong arm, although he has yet to master an outfielder's footwork. At this level, scouts look for raw ability and "coachability" and Restovich has both. "You ask who my favorite players have been here, well, he's already up there," Elizabethton general manager Ray Smith said.

"He's got all the ability and he's got outstanding work habits and a quality head on his shoulders. He's very mature for a 19-year-old. He'll give the people in the Twin Cities a lot of enjoyment one day." Elizabethton manager Jon Mathews put it this way: "He's going to be a PR person's dream." Said former Elizabethton general manager Carmon Dugger: "I think he's going to make it." High school players can take four or five years to reach the majors. Restovich knew that when he signed with the Twins instead of accepting a scholarship to Notre Dame. "I basically went all summer thinking I'd go to Notre Dame," Restovich said.

"That had always been my goal. Before I realized I Smith took the GM job which is reserved for the person who runs the parks and rec department. Nowadays Dugger tends to his farm, builds rooms and decks onto his luxurious, memorabilia-filled house in the hills, and catches the ends of E-Twins games. He played in the Appalachian League in the '50s and decades later began paving the way or un -paving a street for his successors. "Our first year here, I had 10 players stay with me," Dugger said.

"They didn't have a place to live, so I said, Dugger would invite dozens of players into his home. His sister, Erma Dykes, would be host to dozens more, making her the subject of a Wall Street Journal article in 1992. Dugger keeps Twins and E-Twins memorabilia in a room above his living room. The railing is made of baseball bats; the door is adorned with Ray Smith's framed Twins jersey. Behind the door are four walls' worth of baseball cards and autographed pictures, and one bat autographed by Kirby Puckett.

"My thrill is seeing kids move on and become something," Dugger said. "A lot of them have come back to thank me." Dugger is the unofficial chronicler of Appalachian League baseball. He says Muscle Shoals was the best player the league has ever seen, and Puckett was the best the E-Twins have had. "We're going to have Muscle over here for legends night later this season," Dugger Local knowledge Ask for something exotic in Elizabeth-ton a coffee house or a beer and a hotel clerk will laugh loudly and say, "Oh, you've got to go to Johnson City for that." Elizabethton is dry. Nearby Johnson City has all the bars, and a few of the luxuries Elizabethton lacks.

"There isn't any cable on the other side of the river, where we stay," said Restovich, a rookie from Rochester, Minn. "Luckily the guy who owns our house put up a little satellite dish, so we get everything. "The guy also owns a furniture store, and he furnished the place. It's obvious he's not renting the place to us for the money, which is nice." Ministering the faithful In 1992, Harold Mains was diagnosed with colon cancer. "Within 30 days, my wife had colon cancer surgery," said Mains, a minister.

"Right now we're the only ones in the Johnson City Medical Center that are in this category a husband and wife with the same kind of cancer. But we praise the Lord. She's working full time, and I'm here." Mains, an E-Town native, played and coached baseball in New Jersey before returning to Tennessee. In 1993, he became team chaplain. This year, he is serving as president.

The only man in the crowd wearing a suit, he hands players' parents flowers and baskets of fruit, conducts promotions and chats with fans. "I'm into six years of remission," he said. "I can't do things like I used to. I'm alive, and I'm thankful for that. "Every day I'm thankful for the sunshine.

And every day there is a cloud." During chemotherapy, Mains' doctor told him he needed a diversion. "I came to Joe O'Brien Field," Mains said. "I met Ray Smith and Carmon Dugger for the first time, and sat down in the bullpen area. The best medicine that could have been given to me was Twins baseball." Only 49 of the 700-some players who have interned in Elizabethton have made it to the majors. For every Kirby Puckett who polished his game by day and his own cleats at night there is a hard-luck case.

Twins officials still talk about the tal-' ented draftee who, while playing in Eliza- bethton, was found to have diabetes, ulnar nerve damage, elbow chips and night blindness. He might have made it, had the Twins needed a DH for day games. Players fresh out of high school, col- lege or Latin America learn about new cultures and not just the easy-going I Tennessee drawl. One U.S.-born player once asked a Latin teammate "how long it takes to drive to Venezuela." After enduring the rites of spring in Florida, the youngest players in the Twins' organization board a bus to E- Town, to embark on a rite of passage a G-rated version of "Bull Durham." "For some kids," said minor league fields coordinator Larry Corrigan, "it's like making it to the majors, to be told to get on that bus." Watching them, helping them, are the caretakers of E-Town baseball people who say they don't know what they'd do without their Twins. Dugger dug it up Soon after Rantz and Dugger shook hands on that cool night 25 years ago, Rantz began making demands.

The park would have to be bigger. The fences would have be moved inside the light poles. "No problem," said Dugger, in one of his more emotional speeches. Dugger grabbed a backhoe and began digging up the street that ran behind the field. The city manager saw him and, panicked, told Dugger that a road couldn't be erased without meetings, votes.

"Looks like I've already taken care of it," Dugger said. Then he finished the job. Dugger served as president and general manager of the team until he retired in 1991, and former Twins catcher Ray might get drafted, Notre Dame was a lock. But once I was drafted, that made things difficult. The more the summer went on, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that what I wanted to do with my life was play baseball.

And signing would give me the best chance to succeed. "I know some people think they need to go to college as a part of the maturing process, but I've always been around older people. I thought I could handle it." On a recent weekday, Restovich sat at an aluminum picnic table in Elizabethton's clubhouse, eating lunch out of a Styrofoam container of grocery-store food. As he talked, an old movie played on the television stacked on top of the lockers and he handed out morsels to teammates, who were dressing quietly. "This is a strange life," Restovich said.

"You usually don't know if it's Tuesday or Saturday, because the routine's the same. Education is very important to my family, and my parents worry that I'm not reading enough. My dad got me the Kirby Puckett book, and I'm starting to read it now. "Sometimes I talk to them on the phone, and start talking the way I talk in here, and I must sound like I've never spoken the language before." Restovich worried about spending his first four years out of high school in the lower minors, not high education. So far, he has been happy with Elizabethton, the Twins' organization, and teammates.

"I really checked it out, went looking for negatives, when I was considering signing," Restovich said. "I wanted to know what could go wrong. People told me that playing every day can be tough, that fighting off slumps can be tough. But I think I made the right decision. I've really enjoyed it all so far." E7 I 5 1 'itlr-L milium Pastor Harold Mains, who is also the team president, jokes with infielder Juan Lorenzo during a recent practice.

Continued on next page "I made $600 a month, and 1 was just happy to be playing. After taxes, rent, groceries and the phone bill, I was (low to $25. Playing for Free and loving it." hf i 1 7 4 Kirby Puckett Gary GaetrJ if Future stars Elizabethton fans have caught an early glimpse of many future big league stars during the minor league franchise's 25-year affiliation with the Twins. Here's a position-by-position look at the best players who have made a stop at Elizabethton in the past 25 years: i i alumni who have made the big leagues, Including 1 Player Posltton i Bjzabethton stats In the majors Kent Hrbek IB .203, 1 HR. 11 RBI in 79 293 career HR, two World Steve Lombardozzi 2B .321.

6 HR, 38 R3I in '81 Starter at second base for '87 Twins JayBell SS .220. 6 HR, 30 RBI in84 Ail Star SS for Pirates in '93, npw with Arizona Gary Gaetti 3B .257,14 HR, 42 RBI in 79 323 major league home runs, and counting Kirby Puckett OF .382, 3 HR, 3.5 RBI in '82 .318 career average, Marty Cordova OF .284, 8 HR, 29 RBI in '89 Rookie of Year 1 1 1 RBI in '96 Jim Eisenreich OF .298, 3 1 HR, .41 RBI, 81 .293 career average in 14 major league seasons Butch Wynegar .346. 8 HR. 51 RBI in 74 .255 with 1,102 hits in 13 major league seasons Gene Lark in DH .326, 6 i HR, 37 RBI in '84 Drove in winn ing run in 7 of '91 World Ser ies penny Neagle SP 1-2, 4.50 ERA in '89 20:5 for Atlanta in '97 Allan Anderson SP 1-3, 8.53 ERA in '83 AL leader with 2.45 ERA in '88 Mark Portugal SP 7-1, 3.71 ERA in '81 Was 18-4 for Houston in '93 LaTroy Hawkins SP 01,3.38 ERA in '92 Member of Twins current starting rotation Jesse Orosco RP 4 4, 1.13 ERA in 78 In 18th season as major league reliever Eddie Guardado RP 5-4, 1.86 ERA in '91 In sixth season as Twins reliever; pitched IJIUII JsHl Denny 'fA I Neagle A KentHrbek.