Joe Mauer makes an appearance on this list.
Joe Mauer makes an appearance on this list. (USATSI)

Over the course of the next month, we'll venture through the history of each of the 30 Major League Baseball franchises, discussing some of the best and worst moments, players, teams, etc. It's more a fun snapshot for discussion purposes than a be-all, end-all declaration. We continue today with the Minnesota Twins.

Major League Baseball has seen the Minnesota Twins play ball since 1961, but the franchise has been around since 1901, as it was originally the first installment of the Washington Senators. In all, the franchise has 14 playoff appearances, six AL pennants and three World Series championships, with two of those coming in Minnesota. Let's check the Twinkies out.

Best team: 1991

The most recent World Series winner in the franchise was also the best team in my opinion. Several teams were better in the regular season but failed to get it done in October. The '91 Twins were 95-67, winning the AL West by eight games, and then took down Toronto in the ALCS, four games to one. What followed was one of the greatest World Series in history -- more on that in a bit -- with the Twins winning an epic Game 7.

The Twins were tops in the AL in average and on-base percentage while also boasting the second-best ERA. They had power (Kent Hrbek, Chili Davis), speed (Chuck Knoblauch) and star power (Kirby Puckett, Jack Morris). It was a pretty well-rounded team under beloved manager Tom Kelly.

Best player: Walter Johnson

The Big Train is arguably the best pitcher in baseball history and he spent all 21 seasons with the Senators, going 417-279 with a 2.17 ERA, 1.06 WHIP and 3509 strikeouts. He led the league in wins six times, ERA five times, complete games six times, shutouts seven times, innings five times, strikeouts 12 times and WHIP six times. He won two MVPs, even though the award wasn't handed out through much of his prime.

Only Babe Ruth and Cy Young have higher career WARs.

Oh yeah, and there's this: Johnson is the career leader in shutouts with 110, with the second-most in history being 90 (Pete Alexander).

Best player, Twins: Harmon Killebrew

This is a Minnesota-centric post, though, so we'll also throw in a best player for this version of the franchise. Killer began his career with the Senators, but 14 years of his career came in Minnesota. As a member of the Twins, Killebrew led the league in homers five times. He won the 1969 MVP and finished in the top five of MVP voting six times. He was so feared he led the league in walks four times and had at least 90 walks in 10 different seasons.

In all, Killebrew slugged 573 homers and drove home 1584 runs. His career average was just .256, but keep those walks and that power in mind. His .376 on-base percentage and .509 slugging percentage help him to rank 80th in career OPS and 58th in OPS+.

Best oddity: 1987 run differential

The 1987 Twins were the World Series champions, the first of which to come in Minnesota. During the regular season, though, they were just 85-77 and, get this, they were actually outscored. They allowed 806 runs while scoring just 786. They ranked eighth in the AL in runs scored and were 10th in ERA. They were actually statistically below average in many important areas.

The most important area is winning, though, and they did so just enough to get to the postseason -- they won the AL West by two games, but four teams in the AL East had a better record -- and then took care of business in October. What a fun champion.

Best moment(s): 1991 World Series

Kirby Puckett's walkoff bomb in Game 6 forced a Game 7 ...

... and in Game 7, Jack Morris threw one of the greatest gems in history:

The series featured two worst-to-first teams and five one-run games. I think an argument could be made it was the best World Series ever, but that's probably a topic that deserves a lot more research and discussion.

Worst team: 1904 Senators

One of the worst teams in baseball history, the Senators were a pathetic 38-113. They were last in the league in runs, hits, average, OBP, slugging, ERA, pitcher strikeouts and more. They were outscored 743-437 (-306 run differential). Man, they sucked.

Worst roster move: Cutting David Ortiz

A 26-year-old Ortiz had hit .272/.339/.500 (120 OPS+) with 32 doubles, 20 homers and 75 RBI in 466 plate appearances in 2002. He was released the following offseason, picked up by the Red Sox and the rest, as they say, is history. It would've been a tough move to justify in hindsight even if he'd shown no promise, but he was very productive in 2002.

Best roster move: Getting Johan Santana

At the 1999 winter meetings, the Marlins selected Santana from the Astros in the Rule 5 draft in order to send him to the Twins for Jared Camp. All Johan would do is morph into the best pitcher in baseball, winning the AL Cy Young twice for the Twins. From 2003-06, he was 67-22 with a 2.81 ERA (162 ERA+), 0.99 WHIP and 917 strikeouts against only 193 walks.

Worst postseason opponent: Yankees

Under Ron Gardenhire, the Twins made the playoffs six times out of nine seasons from 2002-10. Unfortunately, most of the time they ran into the Yankees and it wasn't pretty. In 2003, the Yankees beat the Twins three games to one in the ALDS. The result was the same in 2004. In 2009 and 2010, the Yankees swept the Twins in the ALDS round. So of those six playoff trips, the Twins faced the Bronx Bombers four times and went 2-12, losing all four series. Yuck.

Best logo: The Twin Cities

The Twins have actually had lots of great logos, but this is no contest. It's a classic. I love that Target Field has this logo up in deep center field. It's a great touch to a beautiful ballpark.

Best tag: Kent Hrbek

Uh oh, Braves fans are gonna be mad.

Worst series of trades: Johan Santana, Carlos Gomez, J.J. Hardy

It had become clear the Twins weren't going to pony up the dough to keep Santana once he hit free agency, so they needed to trade him. In return, they got Carlos Gomez, Philip Humber, Kevin Mulvey and Deolis Guerra. Knowing what we know now, just getting Gomez back would've meant a good return. After two poor seasons, though, Gomez was traded to the Brewers for J.J. Hardy.

OK, well, Hardy wouldn't have been awful in return for Santana, given that arm problems prematurely slowed Johan and Hardy's a two-time All-Star.

The Twins traded Hardy after one season with Brendan Harris to the Orioles for Brett Jacobson and Jim Hoey.

The bottom line is that the Twins at different points in time had made the Johan trade into a star center fielder and a productive shortstop. They now have neither.

Best All-Star Game moment: Glen Perkins, Kurt Suzuki, 2014

Perkins was born in St. Paul, went to high school in Stillwater, MN, went to the University of Minnesota and then got to close down the All-Star Game for the AL in Minnesota's Target Field. He pitched to Twins backstop Suzuki. That's pretty awesome.

Best pure hitter: Rod Carew

While he didn't have near the power of Killebrew or some other Twins greats, the Hall of Famer Carew could handle the bat better than most in the history of baseball. In 12 years for the Twins, he hit .334 while racking up over 2,000 hits. He won seven batting titles while only striking out an average of 60 times per season.

Best hometown hero: Joe Mauer

Other great players from the area played for the Twins, such as Paul Molitor, Jack Morris and Dave Winfield, but none of them spent much time with the Twins. Mauer was born and raised in St. Paul, taken by the Twins with the first overall pick in the 2001 draft over bigger names at the time like Mark Teixeira and Mark Prior and then starred for multiple playoff teams for the Twins. The six-time All-Star has three batting titles and an MVP. He's unfortunately not very popular at present due to having down years in 2011 and 2014 with a gigantic salary and not being able to consistently stay on the field. Hopefully things get turned around on this front eventually, because Mauer is a lifetime Minnesotan.

So what say you, Twins fans? Add to the list with impunity. It's your forum.

Up Next: On Tuesday, we'll look at the best and worst of the Chicago White Sox.

>> Want more franchise bests/worsts? CHC | MIL | STL | CIN | PIT | CLE | DET