Rodney Cline Carew was born on a train in Gatun, Panama on October 1, 1945. He moved with his family to New York when he was fourteen years old, and signed with the Minnesota Twins on the day he graduated from high school.
Rod Carew is one of the most talented players to ever don a major league uniform. During his illustrious nineteen-year career he was selected to eighteen All-Star teams. He is the all-time All-Star vote leader with thirty-three million votes – six million more than the runner-up. His career statistics explain why on January 8, 1991, he became only the 22nd player in history to be voted into Baseball’s Hall of Fame on the first ballot.
Rod had a lifetime batting average of .328 and averaged better than .300 for 15 consecutive seasons. He averaged .344 for the decade of the seventies.
In his twelve seasons with the Minnesota Twins, and seven with the California Angels, Rod amassed 3,053 career hits, twelfth on the all-time list at the time of his retirement. He won seven batting titles, a figure surpassed only by Ty Cobb, Tony Gwynn and Honus Wagner.
Rod and Willie Mays are the only players in baseball history to be Rookie of the Year (1967), Most Valuable Player (1977), have 3,000 hits and be voted into the Hall of Fame (1991).
Rod was also named the Roberto Clemente Award winner (1977) by Major League Baseball as the player who best exemplifies the game of baseball, sportsmanship and community involvement. He was only the third person to have his uniform (#29) retired by two teams.