Matthew J. Ellinghuysen, The Mastermind Behind the Minnesota Twins, Dies at 90

Saint Charles Press

Published June 15, 2081

by Ben Colvin

Matt Ellinghuysen, whose love for the game of baseball and the Minnesota Twins, combined with hard-working and humble work ethic, allowed him to become the Twins Director of Player Development, died  Sunday night at his home in Saint Charles, Minn. He was 90.

The cause was heart failure resulting from natural causes, his family said.

Ellinghuysen’s love for the game of baseball started very young, when he lived no more than a stone’s throw away from the high school baseball field, and was the neighbor to the retired head high school baseball coach.

He was born in Rochester, Minn., on Easter Sunday March 31, 1991 to Marti and Deb Ellinghuysen. He started playing baseball as soon as he was able to walk and got his first bat and ball at the age of two. His father and mother, Marti and Deb Ellinghuysen would make home movies of the youngster hitting baseballs off a tee, and then running imaginary bases.

On July 5, 1993, Mr. Ellinghuysen’s brother, Joseph A. Ellinghuysen was born; and from the point when Joey himself was able to play baseball, he became Matt’s catch partner for life.

Ellinghuysen started playing organized baseball at the age of 4, and many could see even at such a young age he was much more advanced than other children of his age.  “I used to have to tell Matt to stay back and let the other children try to make a play, because otherwise he would have went after every ball that was hit,” state J.B. Mathison, Ellinghuysen’s youth t-ball coach.  Matt went on to play baseball in elementary and high school, making the varsity team his sophomore year.  Each year he received Three-Rivers All Conference awards and his senior year he was named All-Subsection, All-Section, and All-State which is the highest honor for a baseball player in the state of Minnesota.

He graduated from Saint Charles High School in the spring of 2009 with academic honors He attended Bemidji State University (BSU), where he played baseball, and graduated with a degree in sport management and a minor in mass communications.

Mr. Ellinghuysen interned with the Rochester Honkers, an amateur college baseball team from the Northwoods League.  While working with the Honkers, Ellinghuysen met Shauna Mckenzie who also worked for the Honkers, and they married three years later.

After graduating from BSU, he was hired full-time in the Honkers’ front office as director of game-day operations.  He worked there for ten years during which the Honkers’ won six Northwoods League Championships.  Mr. Ellinghuysen moved on to become the director of game-day operations for the Fort Meyers, Miracle, the Minnesota Twins single-A team.

From then on Ellinghuysen was highly respected in the Twins Organization, and slowly moved his way up until 2046, he became the director of player development for the Twins.  Here he decided who the Twins scouted, drafted, and which players to call up to the major leagues or send down back to the minors.  During his time as Director of Player Development, the Twins won two World Series Trophies.  In an article by ESPN the magazine Ellinghuysen said about the World Series victories that, “If you would have ever asked me, I would have never guessed I would be working for the team I grew up with cheering for.  It has been a great honor.”

After retiring after his 25 year in the Twins organization, Ellinghuysen moved back to where he grew up in Saint Charles, Minn., and spent his remaining years there with his family while being highly involved in the community and high school athletics.  Shortly before he died the Saint Charles Press asked him what he had thought about all his accomplishments and he said, “I am very humble to have done everything I did, which along the way I cannot thank those who helped me enough, starting at a young age when my parents raised me and gave me a strong base to live life by.   So many people have done great things for me in my life, and I hope after I am long gone, that people will say the same about me.”

Ellinghuysen is survived by his wife Shauna; his son Michael who is married to Mary Swanson Ellinghuysen; and his grandchildren Carl and Tessa.