MINNEAPOLIS -- Torii Hunter grew up in Pine Bluff playing baseball, and baseball helped Hunter grow up after the Minnesota Twins drafted him in the first round (20th overall) of the 1993 MLB Draft.
The match proved mutually beneficial, and Hunter was inducted into the Twins Hall of Fame in a ceremony at Target Field on Saturday night before Minnesota played the Cleveland Indians.
Hunter said the timing of his induction into the Twins Hall of Fame surprised him.
"I'm still kind of shocked that I was nominated and voted in this early [after retirement]," Hunter said Friday at Target Field during a news conference. "It's a roller coaster, actually, because I just retired, so I'm just trying to get used to retirement. I gave my retirement speech and now I've got to give this speech."
Hunter's approach to the game was as impressive as the numbers he put up.
"He played the game as hard as anyone I've ever seen," said Los Angeles Angels Manager Mike Scioscia, who coached Hunter from 2008-2012 after he signed with the Angels as a free agent. "The internal drive to just to go out there and play. He just loved the game and played it really hard."
That wasn't always the case. In 1997, while playing for the Twins' Class AA affiliate in New Britain, Conn., Hunter said he nearly quit the game.
"I shared a car with my teammate, Armann Brown. It was a rental. It cost $6.99 a day. It was a Geo Prizm. We also shared an apartment. It was a rental. It cost $6.99 a day. It was a Geo Prizm," Hunter wrote in a January essay for The Players Tribune. "We couldn't afford a $19-a-day hotel room because we had just broken spring training and we hadn't gotten paid yet. We opened the regular season with a seven-game homestand. But until we got that paycheck, we had nowhere to stay. After each game, we'd sit in the car and wait for everybody else to leave the stadium. Then we'd drop the Prizm seats down and sleep right there in the parking lot."
His patience paid off when he was called up to the Twins for one game in the 1997 season, played in six more in 1998 and won a job in the outfield during the 1999 season.
"I just wanted one day in the majors," Hunter said Friday. "One day and a cup of coffee so I could tell my grandkids I played."
Things began to turn around, Hunter said, when he began receiving advice from Hall of Famers Kirby Puckett and Dave Winfield.
"I remember Kirby giving me a check one day. He said, 'Open that. My eyes are hurting.' So I opened the check and it was a big amount and I'm like, 'Oh my God! Is that what you guys make in the big leagues?'
"So that was kind of a motivation and then Dave Winfield, one of the nicest guys in the game of baseball, started showing me his family pictures. He just sat down and showed me his home and different things like that, and I was really inspired by his home.
"Just to see those things and those guys helping me learn how to carry myself and talk to me about life ... I really appreciate that because you would never know that unless someone teaches you," Hunter said.
Hunter began to make a name for himself in 2002, when he made the first of five All-Star Game appearances. In the only All-Star Game called a tie because both teams ran out of pitchers, Hunter made the defensive play of the game in the bottom of the first inning when he reached over the wall in right-center field to take a home run away from then-San Francisco Giants outfielder Barry Bonds.
He batted .289 that season with 29 home runs and 94 RBI, leading the Twins to the American League Championship Series, where they lost to the Anaheim Angels in five games.
Hunter played five more seasons for the Twins and was named to his second All-Star Game in 2007, when he hit .287 with 28 home runs and 107 RBI in 160 games, the most games he played in a single season. He played in 1,373 games for the Twins, and his 214 home runs are tied for sixth most for the franchise. Hunter won nine Gold Gloves in his career, the first seven coming with the Twins, which is second most for the franchise behind former pitcher Jim Kaat's 12.
He signed with the Angels as a free agent in 2008 and played another five seasons before spending two seasons with the Detroit Tigers. His final season in 2015 was spent back with the Twins, where his presence in the clubhouse was as valuable as his 22 home runs and 81 RBI.
"He added exponentially to the enjoyment of managing the team," Twins Manager Paul Molitor told the Minneapolis Star-Tribune. "Just his personality, his leadership -- and he certainly played well."
"I just had so much fun. We had that chance to get that playoff berth, and it went down to the last day of the season," Hunter said. "All in all, last season was a lot of fun. I had a great time watching these young guys grow."
Hunter said his heart was with the Twins even while playing for the Angels and Tigers.
"I would watch what those guys were doing. I was calling guys and saying, 'You're not hitting right. You're not doing this right. You gotta do this.' Just to come back home and play in front of the fans I grew up with ... I missed them, so I came back to get that feeling again," Hunter said.
For his career, Hunter played in 2,372 games, finishing with 2,452 hits which included 353 home runs. He also had 1,391 RBI and a career .277 batting average.
Having fun with his teammates and the environment in the clubhouse are what Hunter said he misses most now that he's retired.
"You can't find that anywhere in the world," Hunter said. "There were always jokes, but we had real talk sessions about marriage, about financial literacy, about life. We talked about the game, of course. When guys were doing well or guys were doing bad, we tried to pick up each other, inspire each other."
Sports on 07/17/2016