Safety issue spurs Twins to move Target Field's trees

For Twins hitters, the trees beyond the center field wall at Target Field aren’t a performance issue, they're a safety issue.

“The trees are beautiful,” Michael Cuddyer said Saturday at TwinsFest. “But they cast three different shades on the background -- in the view of the hitter. Especially those 3 o’clock games on Saturday, it’s scary. It’s literally scary. It’s not that I’m worried I’m not going to be able to see the ball, hit the ball. I’m literally scared I’m not going to see the ball period.”

Cuddyer said there were times when he was hitting and could not see the ball. So when Twins president Dave St. Peter said Friday that the team will probably move those trees, the team’s hitters were relieved.

One important thing to note is that the team does plan to transplant those Black Hills Spruce trees.

“We do not yet have a plan for where they end up, but I guarantee that they will be authenticated and then removed in order to be lifted out and transplanted elsewhere ... be it on site or another place,” Twins head groundskeeper Larry DiVito wrote in an e-mail. “They will not be cut down.”