(Photo by: Gene Puskar)
Justin Morneau is 3-for-3 as the Pirates’ clean-up hitter tonight against the Milwaukee Brewers.
Jim Souhan of the Star Tribune caught up with Morneau in Milwaukee for a Q&A. The most revealing part of the conversation was Morneau saying Joe Mauer is frustrated that Morneau was traded.
“I talked to him and he’s frustrated with what happened,” Morneau told Souhan. “But at the same time, I think he’s happy that I get to come into a situation where I get to compete in a pennant race, because he knows that’s what we play for.”
More on why he thinks Mauer is frustrated…
“I think he’s frustrated with everything,” Morneau said. “It’s been a frustrating couple of years for everybody — for Terry (Ryan), Gardy (Ron Gardenhire), myself, Joe. People who have high expectations.”
Two straight 90 loss seasons, and a third quite possibly less than a month away, are pretty good reasons for Mauer to feel the way Morneau says he does.
In a related note, the Pioneer Press reports that Mauer took batting practice Tuesday. He’s recovering from a concussion.
Check out a couple more interesting answers from Morneau.
On his favorite memory with the Twins:
The favorite one for me would probably be sitting in the dome the last day of the season in 2006, watching the game in Kansas City up on the screen, when nobody left the stadium. That’s not something you could ever script or plan. That just kind of happened. That was something we all shared with the fans and our teammates. That was insanity. That was probably my favorite thing I can think of.
On possibly playing for the Twins again in the future:
I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it. That’s too hard to answer that right now.
