Football great Ernie Nevers, born in Willow River, Minnesota, pitched for the St. Louis Browns for parts of three seasons (1926-1928).
Dan Topping was part-owner of the New York Yankees from 1945-1966.
Tom Austin is a long-time college baseball coach at Methodist University in Fayetteville, North Carolina.
Outfielder Mike Fuentes was drafted by Minnesota in the fifth round in 1980, but did not sign.
Brian Gorman has been a major league umpire since 1993.
Right-hander Robert Griffin Keppel pitched for the Twins for a little over half of 2009. Born in St. Louis, he was drafted by the Mets in the first round in 2000. He was a starting pitcher most of his minor league career. He appears to have battled injuries much of the time, as his games and innings pitched numbers make it appear that he may have missed at least a little time nearly every season. His effectiveness went up and down; Keppel’s best year was probably 2003, when he went 9-4, 2.97 with a WHIP of 1.20 in 109 innings. He was released by the Mets in May of 2005 despite the fact that he had made five pretty good starts at AAA Norfolk. He was out of baseball the rest of the season, signing with Kansas City the next February. Keppel made eight appearances (six starts) with the Royals in 2006, but did not pitch well either there or at AAA and became a free agent after the season. He signed with Colorado for 2007 and made four relief appearances for the Rockies in April, but again had a poor year both there and at AAA. He moved on to the Marlins organization for 2008, again pitched poorly, and signed with Minnesota for 2009. In Rochester, he had his first good season in some time, going 3-3, 2.49 with a 1.15 WHIP in 55.2 innings before being called up to the Twins in late June. He stayed the rest of the season, going 1-1, 4.83 with a 1.56 WHIP in 54 innings. He made 37 appearances, all in relief. The Twins released him in January of last year. He signed with the Nippon Ham Fighters in Japan in 2010, had a couple of fine seasons there, missed most of 2012 due to injury, then made eight mostly poor starts for Nippon Ham in 2013. He came back to the United States and signed a minor league contract with Cincinnati for 2014, but instead decided to help run the family's landscaping business, Mid-America Lawn Maintenance, in the St. Louis area.
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