The most famous of those Gopher teams was the 1909 club lead by a star University of Minnesota athlete, Bobby Marshall who competed in baseball, track and football, and was elected tothe College Football Hall of Fame in 1971.
Those 1909 Gophers knocked off the star team of that era, the CHicago Leland Giants, for the unofficial championship of Negro baseball. The Giants' star was pitcher "Rube" Foster, who eventually ended up in the MLB Hall of Fame, and is widely thought to be the finest African-American pitcher of the first part of the century. Foster did pitch against those Gopher teams. He also pitched for those Gopher teams from time-to-time. Many star players were brought in to be ringers in those black ballclubs.
Going into the series, the Twins are 7 1/2 games ahead of Cleveland in the AL Central, with the Indians hosting Kansas City.
