Mauer's popularity remains very high

Joe Mauer isn't having a season close to the one that made him the 2009 MVP, but fans still recall that great year, and for that reason he topped the All-Star voting.

Last season at the All-Star break, Mauer had played in 64 games and was batting .373 with 15 home runs and 49 RBI and had a .622 slugging percentage.

Wednesday's loss to Toronto was Mauer's 73rd game this season. He is batting .301, with four home runs, 35 RBI and a .437 slugging percentage.

The word around the clubhouse is that Mauer was a lot healthier last year at the All-Star break and that he is playing hurt this season.

"I'm in the lineup, so I'm good," Mauer said. "You get banged up throughout the year, and there's some days I need to take off to try to get the body healthy. But I'm feeling pretty good, and I'm trying to stay in that lineup."

No doubt Mauer has hit some balls hard that have been caught, especially in the recent series with Tampa Bay when the Rays outfielders made one great catch after another on his long drives.

"I've had some tough luck, I guess," Mauer said. "But you've just got to keep working hard and those hits will fall in eventually."

"They're making adjustments to me and I'm making adjustments to them, so nothing different," Mauer said.

Mauer said he doesn't worry about his statistics.

"I'm not happy when we're not winning games," he said. "That's the biggest thing. I've never really been a big numbers guy or anything like that. The only numbers that matter are wins and losses."

He was very happy to be voted into his third All-Star Game by fans.

"Getting voted in by the fans is definitely special, and I'm happy to be going again, just being there, kind of taking in the whole two days," he said. "It's two crazy days, but the best players in the league come there and play and usually the cities put on a great show."

"Just to go to an All-Star Game is awesome," he said. "To have your teammate starting with you, it's going to be special. I'm really excited that Justin is starting this year."

Mauer also threw some support to outfielder Delmon Young, who is among five players who could be added to the roster in an online vote by fans.

"He definitely deserves it," Mauer said. "If there's more Twins, that's a good thing."

Mauer has said he won't participate in the Home Run Derby at the All-Star Game.

"I did it last year and had a great time doing it," he said. "I don't think I'll be up for it this year."

"We feel good about our chances in here," Mauer said. "We're going to have ups and downs throughout the season and we've just got to keep getting after it."

Mauer has been active in endorsing products this season and has enjoyed it.

"There's been some pretty good opportunities out there, and I've even been able to do a couple with my mom, so that's pretty neat," he said.

New park suits Thome Jim Thome, who recently passed Harmon Killebrew on the career home run list and has been very hot with his bat at home, was asked if the new Target Field plays to his strengths.

"It's a good ballpark," he said. "The atmosphere is great, the fans really get into it.

The Tigers played a shifted defense against Thome with only one infielder on the left side.

"You know, again, I try not to really worry about what the opponents are doing, how they're putting their defense against me," Thome said. "I'm just trying to have good at-bats.

"You know what, sometimes I just hit the ball to left field. But, again, you're just trying to have solid at-bats."

Jottings Gophers athletic director Joel Maturi said he expects the University of Minnesota to appeal the recent court verdict in which a jury awarded Jimmy Williams $1.25 million, ruling that Williams was led to believe he had been hired by Gophers coach Tubby Smith. Williams quit a job at Oklahoma State, but then Maturi wouldn't allow the hiring because Williams had been linked previously to NCAA violations.

On another subject, Maturi definitely wants the Gophers to be in the same division of the expanded Big Ten with Iowa, Wisconsin and Nebraska and believes that will happen.

It's good news for the Gophers basketball team that Al Nolen, who was ineligible the second semester last year, has improved his academics. The Gophers suffered last year after Nolen, who had started 17 games, was lost to the team. Nolen had made nearly 40 percent of his three-point shots, and his contribution was missed.

Bobby Bell, the former Gophers football great, will have his No. 78 retired when the 1960 national championship Gophers team is honored at homecoming Oct. 2, when the opponent will be Northwestern.

A very sad story appeared in the Boston Globe about former Gophers and NBA star Ray Williams, who made millions of dollars as a pro but is now homeless and living in his car.

The Gophers football team has signed defensive end Leston Simpson of Lackawanna College, a junior college in Pennsylvania. Simpson is a cousin of Gophers lineman Jeff Wills. The Gophers also signed high school linebacker Quinn Bauducco of Moorpark, Calif.

Former Gophers basketball player Quincy Lewis has started work for the university as a fund-raiser. ... Cornell basketball star Ryan Wittman, who played at Eden Prairie while his father was coaching with the Timberwolves, wasn't drafted, but the Celtics snapped him up for their summer league team. Wittman was the Ivy League player of the year and led Cornell to the NCAA's Sweet 16.