1980 Tassie Medalist wrote:The same man who the 'Twins general manager once said with respect to his contract negotiations, "I'm all for family security for players, but for how many generations....."
Can see what the GM means but in relative terms the Twins have never been a team to shell out the coin and Puckett to be fair did actually knock back a far larger offer from the Boston Red Sox in the very early 90's to stay with the Twins.
Has been a number of early deaths of American sports stars over the years and former Houston Astro Ken Caminiti, who admitted to extensive Steroid use throughout his career died only last year at the age of 42, having only recently retired from the Game.
The deaths of Len Bias, (Boston Celtic) Reggie Lewis were proven to be drug related and the death of Minnesota lineman Korey Stringer has had question marks around it.
I don't think it can be denied there is drug use. In the cases of Mark McGwire and Barry Bonds, they were both rake thin when they entered the majors in their early 20's but both ended up being "huge"
Puckett was a very popular player in Minnesota, who he helped to the '87 and '91 Championships and his .318 lifetime batting average was the highest for a right handed batter since world war II.