Jim Kaat

Lore & Background

Kaat was an All-Star for three seasons and a Gold Glove winner for 16 straight seasons. He was the American League (AL) leader in shutouts (5) in 1962, and the AL leader in wins (25) and complete games (19) in 1966. In accumulating his 283 career wins, he had three 20-win seasons. Kaat won 190 games with the Senators/Twins (all but one win coming with the latter team), second most in club history and most since the team moved to Minnesota; he also has the most Gold Glove Awards of any Twin with 12.

After a brief stint as a pitching coach for the Cincinnati Reds, Kaat became a sportscaster and for the next 22 years, calling games for the New York Yankees and the Minnesota Twins. Following a brief retirement in 2006, he called Pool D for the 2009 World Baseball Classic in Puerto Rico, games for NESN in 2009, and worked for the MLB Network from its inception in 2009 until August 2022. Kaat was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame by the Golden Days Era Committee in (year not specified in source).

Reader's Guide

Kaat spent all of 1957 and 1958 in the minor leagues before breaking into the majors in 1959 with the Washington Senators. After pitching in 16 games spread out over the next two seasons, Kaat became a permanent member of the pitching staff when the Senators franchise moved west in 1961 to become the Minnesota Twins. On July 24, 1963, Kaat threw a complete-game shutout and hit a home run for a 5–0 Twins win over the Indians. Minnesota pitchers have only homered in the same game in which they threw a shutout three times, and Kaat did so twice, a second time on October 1, 1970.

Kaat was a member of the 1965 Twins team that won the American League pennant. He started three games in the 1965 World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers, matching up with Sandy Koufax on all three occasions, including a complete game victory in Game 2. His best season was in 1966, when he led the league with 25 wins and 19 complete games. He finished fifth in the MVP voting and was named the American League Pitcher of the Year by The Sporting News.

Although his 1967 season was somewhat of a let down compared to 1966 (he finished 16–13 with a 3.04 ERA), he went on a tear in September and nearly pitched the Twins to another World Series appearance — cruising to a 7–0 record with a 1.51 ERA and 65 strikeouts in 65 innings pitched. However Kaat sustained a season-ending arm injury in the third inning of the second-to-last game and the Boston Red Sox swept the final two to win the American League pennant.

In 1974, he went 21–13, setting a record for largest gap between 20-win seasons at eight, a mark that stood until broken by David Cone in 1998. Kaat recorded his third 20-win season in 1975, when he posted a 20–14 record and 3.11 ERA while throwing 303.2 innings at the age of 36; an All-Star and Gold Glove winner, he finished fourth in the Cy Young Award voting. Kaat was primarily a front of the rotation starting pitcher until 1979 (when he turned 40 in his 21st season), twice leading the AL in starts, with 42 in 1965 and 41 in 1966.

He became a relief pitcher that season, split between the Philadelphia Phillies and the New York Yankees, following three up and down years in the Phillies rotation (where he'd arrived in an off-season trade from the Chicago White Sox with Mike Buskey in exchange for Dick Ruthven, Alan Bannister and Roy Thomas on December 10, 1975).

Did You Know?

• He won the Gold Glove Award for 16 consecutive seasons (1962–1977), a record for pitchers at the time.
• Kaat used the same baseball glove for 15 seasons.
• He is one of only 29 players in baseball history to have appeared in Major League games in four decades.
• Kaat set a 20th-century record by playing during the administrations of seven U.S. Presidents.