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AL Central Notes: Buxton, Alcala, Alberto, Gaddis

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Byron Buxton was removed from yesterday’s game due to right knee tightness, and he wasn’t in the Twins’ lineup today.  While Buxton’s health history makes any injury seem like a red flag, manager Rocco Baldelli didn’t think the issue was particularly serious, and thought Buxton’s knee might have just been sore from a number of recent plays on the basepaths.  “It’s just by chance that there’s been this many plays that he’s had to go hard on in a very short period of time.  It kind of popped up, I think, because of all the running,” Baldelli told MLB.com’s Do-Hyoung Park and other reporters.

Buxton underwent arthroscopic surgery on that same right knee back in September, and as part of the Twins’ desire to keep their star healthy, Buxton has played exclusively as a designated hitter this season.  While keeping a Gold Glove-caliber center fielder in a DH role may seem like a waste of resources, it’s hard to argue with results, as Buxton has been hitting well (.235/.344/.484 with nine home runs in 180 plate appearances) and has avoided the injured list to date.  Ironically, Buxton has been a source of stability on a Twins team that has been beset with several other injuries, and his bat has been a bright spot in an inconsistent lineup.

More from the AL Central…

  • Sticking with the Twins, Jorge Alcala was placed on the 15-day injured list earlier this week, and head trainer Nick Paparesta gave Park and company some more information on the right-hander’s status.  Alcala has a stress fracture to the radius bone in his right forearm, which Paparesta described as “more of a chronic, ongoing condition and again, nothing to do with his previous elbow surgery.”  Due to the rather unique nature of the injury, it isn’t known exactly how long Alcala might be out, and the Twins will re-evalate him after a shutdown of 10-14 days.  Elbow problems and an arthroscopic debridement surgery limited Alcala to just 2 1/3 innings in 2022, and he had posted only a 6.46 ERA over 15 1/3 innings out of Minnesota’s bullpen this season.
  • Hanser Alberto left today’s game with what the White Sox described as left shoulder soreness.  After dropping a sacrifice bunt, Alberto appeared to hurt his shoulder while making a “safe” sign after a very close play at first base.  Alberto is day to day with the injury, and manager Pedro Grifol told The Athletic’s James Fegan and other reporters that the infielder could be able to avoid the 10-day injured list.  There isn’t much time for Alberto to rest or for the Sox to play with an undermanned roster, since the White Sox are six games into a stretch of 19 games in 19 days.
  • The Guardians will call up Hunter Gaddis for a start on Monday, according to The Athletic’s Zack Meisel (via Twitter).  A fresh starter was needed when Peyton Battenfield was placed on the 15-day IL on Friday, so the Guards will turn to Gaddis for at least one outing, though an off-day on Thursday could allow them to reset the rotation.  Gaddis made his MLB debut last season and made four starts this season while Triston McKenzie has been sidelined with injury, but the results haven’t yet been there at the big league level.  The 25-year-old righty has a 6.86 ERA over 19 2/3 innings this season, with a minuscule 14.6% strikeout rate.

Twins Sign Austin Brice To Minor League Deal

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The Twins picked up some pitching depth in the upper minors yesterday, as the club signed right-hander Austin Brice to a minor league deal, according to MLB.com’s transaction tracker, which also notes that Brice has been assigned to Triple-A St. Paul.

Brice, 31 in June, made his major league debut in 2016 as a member of the Marlins. He ultimately would pitch just 14 innings with the club before being sent to Cincinnati as part of the deal that sent Luis Castillo to Cincinnati. He would pitch out of the Reds’ bullpen for the next two season, posting a 5.40 ERA in 70 innings of work before a series of waiver claims throughout the 2018-19 offseason took him back to Miami, where he posted his best season to date with a 3.43 ERA in 44 2/3 innings of work.

Since then, Brice was traded to the Red Sox, with whom he struggled to a 6.21 ERA across parts of two seasons, and signed a minor league deal with the Pirates ahead of the 2022 season, though he made just four appearances with the club. Overall, Brice has a 5.12 ERA in 168 2/3 innings of work throughout his career with a 21.8% strikeout rate and a 9% walk rate. Home runs have primarily been Brice’s issue during his time in the majors, as the journeyman reliever has allowed a concerning 17.6% of all career fly balls to leave the yard.

Those issues with the long ball led him to settle for a minor league deal with the Diamondbacks this offseason, though his brief tenure as a member of the organization saw him allow twelve runs (eight earned) over just three innings of work. Now, Brice has caught on with the Twins, with whom he’ll act as pitching depth in the upper levels of the minor leagues alongside the likes of Patrick Murphy and Oliver Ortega.

Twins Place Jorge Polanco On 10-Day Injured List

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The Twins placed second baseman Jorge Polanco on the 10-day injured list due to a left hamstring strain.  The placement is retroactive to May 18.  Infielder Edouard Julien has been called up from Triple-A to take Polanco’s spot on the active roster.

Polanco had to be removed from Wednesday’s game after hurting his hamstring while trying to beat out a grounder.  Today’s move sends Polanco back to the injured for the second time this season, as he didn’t play his first game until April 21 since the Twins were taking a cautious approach with a lingering knee injury.  Polanco’s 2022 campaign was ended in early September by left knee inflammation, and he didn’t play much in Spring Training since he continued to feel some soreness.

The silver lining is that Polanco has performed well when he’s been able to play, as he has a .284/.327/.484 slash line and four home runs over his 101 plate appearances.  While obviously a small sample size this early, Polanco’s 124 wRC+ matches his career best over a full season.  A .343 BABIP has played a big role and his strikeout/walk rates are both below average, but Polanco’s .369 xwOBA is also higher than his .349 wOBA.

With Nick Gordon also sidelined with a shin fracture, Minnesota’s infield depth has been thinned, but the Twins do have options to replace Polanco at least in the short term.  Donovan Solano and Willi Castro can each get some time at the position, or Kyle Farmer could be moved over from third base if Solano or Castro get a start at the hot corner.  Julien will also be in the mix in his second MLB call-up, as he hit .222/.276/.444 in 30 PA during his first appearance in April.

In the bigger picture, losing Polanco for at least 10 days is another blow to a Twins team that has had trouble both staying healthy and delivering consistent offense.  Carlos Correa and Christian Vazquez are among the Twins hitter who have yet to really get going at the plate, though Minnesota is still in first place in the AL Central thanks largely to an excellent rotation.

Twins To Place Nick Gordon On Injured List With Shin Fracture

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Twins utilityman Nick Gordon was diagnosed with a fractured right shin after fouling a ball off his leg during today’s loss to the Dodgers, tweets Do-Hyoung Park of MLB.com. He’ll be placed on the 10-day injured list and seems likely to be out well beyond the minimal stint.

Gordon’s 2023 campaign began with an injury scare. He suffered a right high ankle sprain in Spring Training but recovered quickly enough to avoid a season-opening IL stay. He’s had a slow start from a performance perspective, though, hitting only .176/.195/.319 over 93 trips to the plate. It has been a disappointing follow-up to a productive .272/.316/.427 showing in a career-high 443 plate appearances for the former fifth overall pick.

Manager Rocco Baldelli has bounced Gordon around the diamond. He’s seen a decent number of innings at each of center field, left field and second base. With Byron Buxton working as a designated hitter as part of Minnesota’s efforts to keep him healthy, the lefty-swinging Gordon has gotten the strong side of a platoon arrangement with right-handed Michael A. Taylor in center field of late.

Gordon’s injury figures to open more playing time for the glove-first Taylor in center field. He’s off to a .231/.286/.404 start to his Twins’ tenure. Donovan Solano and Willi Castro can play multi-positional infield roles off the bench. That could take on particular importance considering second baseman Jorge Polanco also came out of today’s game with an injury.

Polanco told reporters postgame he has a mild strain of his left hamstring (relayed by Betsy Helfand of the St. Paul Pioneer-Press). The team will reevaluate after tomorrow’s off day to determine whether he might require an IL stay. The switch-hitting infielder lost some time at the start of the season rehabbing from a 2022 knee issue. He’s been off to a quality .284/.327/.484 start since returning.

Gordon wasn’t the only Minnesota player to foul a ball off his leg this afternoon. Outfielder Joey Gallo had an early departure after hitting one off his own shin. He said after the game that x-rays were negative but noted there was quite a bit of swelling in the area (Helfand link). He’s presently day-to-day and figures to test things out again on Friday. Gallo missed a bit of time due to an intercostal strain but he’s already slugged 10 homers after signing a one-year free agent deal over the winter.

Twins Select José De León

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The Twins are going to select right-hander José De León to their roster, reports Do-Hyoung Park of MLB.com. He will take the active roster spot of fellow righty Jorge Alcalá, who is going on the 15-day injured list. The club already had an opening on their 40-man roster after losing righty Dereck Rodríguez off waivers to the Braves yesterday. The club has subsequently announced the moves, listing Alcalá’s ailment as a right forearm extensor muscle strain. His IL placement is retroactive to May 15.

De León, 30, was once one of the top prospects in the league. Originally drafted by the Dodgers in 2013, he impressed prospect evaluators enough to land on Baseball America’s top 100 list in both 2016 and 2017, placing in the top 30 both of those years. Unfortunately, he’s battled significant injuries since then and still hasn’t been able to carve out a lengthy stay in the big leagues.

He was traded to the Rays prior to 2017 but then required Tommy John surgery going into 2018. He returned in 2019 and was traded to the Reds after that season. He struggled in his time with that club and was released after 2021. He was with the Blue Jays on a minor league deal last year but got hurt in Spring Training and didn’t debut until August.

Through all of that, he has an 8.44 ERA in the big leagues through 48 innings that have been scattered across five different seasons with three different clubs. He signed a minor league deal with the Twins this offseason and is off to a good start. He’s tossed 27 1/3 innings across nine Triple-A appearances, four of them starts. He has a 3.62 ERA, 22.2% strikeout rate, 10.3% walk rate and 41.6% ground ball rate.

That showing has impressed the Minnesota brass enough that the righty will get back to the majors. He is out of options and can’t be easily sent back to the minors later in the year, but he does have just two years and 95 days of major league service time. That means that he could be cheaply retained for future seasons via arbitration if he manages to hang onto his roster spot all year long.

Injury Notes: Seager, Buehler, Maeda, Hiura

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Rangers shortstop Corey Seager is expected to be activated prior to tonight’s game, per Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News. The 29-year-old Seager, playing in the second season of a decade-long $325MM contract, has missed the past month due to a hamstring strain. He burst out of the gates with a .359/.469/.538 showing through his first 49 trips to the plate and went 2-for-8 with a double, a walk and no strikeouts in a brief three-game rehab assignment at Double-A. In Seager’s absence, 23-year-old Ezequiel Duran has filled in admirably at shortstop, batting .293/.328/.474 on the season, though his bat has cooled off in the past week or so. Manager Bruce Bochy has been impressed enough that he’s pledged to find “creative” ways to keep Duran in the lineup frequently even after Seager’s return.

A few more injury situations of particular note to keep an eye on around the league…

  • Right-hander Walker Buehler is with the team at Dodger Stadium and will throw in the bullpen for the Major League staff to take a look at his progress in recovering from Tommy John surgery, tweets Juan Toribio of MLB.com. Walker is still a ways from being an option in the big leagues. The 28-year-old’s surgery was performed late last August, and the general expectation surrounding him has been that he’ll at best be an option in the final month or so of the season. Still, the fact that Buehler has already had multiple bullpen sessions in Arizona and is slated for more mound work this week at Dodger Stadium is encouraging for both the Dodgers and their fans.
  • The Twins hope that right-hander Kenta Maeda can resume throwing off a mound by the end of the week, tweets Dan Hayes of The Athletic. Maeda hit the injured list with a triceps strain after being tattooed for 10 runs in three innings against the Yankees. He’d previously allowed six runs on 12 hits with a 12-to-1 K/BB ratio in 13 innings (4.15 ERA) after missing the entire 2022 season. The Twins’ rotation depth has been tested early, with Bailey Ober and Louie Varland stepping in for the injured Maeda and Tyler Mahle (Tommy John surgery). A healthy Maeda would again give the Twins six candidates for rotation work, but injuries tend to sort these issues out. And, if everyone is healthy at the same time, the Twins could opt to use Maeda in relief as a means of monitoring his workload after not throwing a pitch last season.
  • Brewers infielder Keston Hiura, currently playing with their Triple-A club, will miss several weeks due to a posterior cruciate ligament injury in his left knee, tweets Adam McCalvy of MLB.com. Hiura won’t require surgery, but the expectation is that he’ll be out of game action until late next month. It’s a tough blow for the former top prospect, who was hoping to play his way back onto the big league roster after clearing outright waivers earlier this year. He’s out to a .331/.396/.678 start with a dozen home runs through 134 plate appearances with Nashville this season and has trimmed his strikeout rate there to 24.6%. Hiura has had similar stretches in Triple-A before, however, and his familiar strikeout woes have regularly resurfaced upon being promoted back to the big leagues. He batted .226/.316/.449 with the Brewers last year (115 wRC+), but because of a staggering 41.7% strikeout rate, he needed a .355 average on balls in play to get to that middling .226 batting average.

Braves Claim Dereck Rodríguez, Transfer Kyle Wright To 60-Day IL

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The Braves announced that they have claimed right-hander Dereck Rodríguez off waivers from the Twins and optioned him to Triple-A Gwinnett. Fellow righty Kyle Wright was transferred to the 60-day injured list in order to open a spot on the 40-man roster.

Rotation depth has suddenly become a serious issue for the Atlanta club. Both Max Fried and Kyle Wright have landed on the injured list recently, with the former battling a forearm strain and the latter a lingering shoulder issue. The reported plan for Fried is for him to be shut down long enough that he will then have to effectively rebuild from scratch, suggesting a potential absence of a couple of months. Last week, Wright said he is expecting to be out of action even longer than Fried, so it’s not a shock to see him land on the 60-day injured list today. He’ll now be ineligible to return until 60 days from his initial IL placement, which was on May 4, ruling him out officially until early July.

Those injuries have cast a spotlight on the club’s starting mix, which is down to three primary members in Spencer Strider, Charlie Morton and Bryce Elder. The club has some depth starters on its 40-man roster that it could call upon, but it doesn’t seem like Michael Soroka will be up in the immediate future. He’s still looking to get into a consistent rhythm after hardly pitching since 2019 due to various injuries, including a pair of Achilles ruptures. Mark Bowman of MLB.com recently spoke to manager Brian Snitker about Soroka, though it doesn’t seem as though the club is going to let the recent injuries to Fried and Wright alter their approach to Soroka’s return to action. Other options on the roster include Dylan Dodd and Jared Shuster, though neither fared especially well in their brief major league looks earlier this year. Ian Anderson won’t be an option for the rest of the year after undergoing Tommy John surgery last month.

All of those question marks give the club a significant challenge in navigating the next couple of months, which is surely what led to the claim of Rodríguez. The right-hander who turns 31 next month had a solid debut season with the Giants in 2018 but has struggled since. That first season in the bigs saw him post an ERA of 2.81 in 118 1/3 innings, but his ERA jumped to 5.64 in the following season. He’s only been able to scratch out sporadic major league outings since then, appearing in five games since the start of 2020.

He’s spent the past couple of seasons bouncing on and off the Twins’ roster. He was twice selected to join the club in 2022, once in April and once in September, making one appearance before getting quickly designated for assignment in each case. He returned to the organization on another minor league deal this winter and was added to the 40-man a couple of weeks ago. He pitched two thirds of an inning on Friday before getting optioned back to Triple-A. It wasn’t publicly reported that he was designated for assignment but the Twins evidently tried to pass him through waivers in recent days, which led to today’s claim.

Prior to getting called up to the big leagues this year, he had made seven appearances for the St. Paul Saints, tossing 19 1/3 innings with a 4.66 ERA while striking out 23.5% of batters faced against an 11.8% walk rate. In 94 2/3 innings at Triple-A last year, he had a 4.75 ERA, 22.7% strikeout rate and 7.9% walk rate. He’ll head to Gwinnett and will presumably be competing with the likes of Dodd and Shuster for roles in the majors over the coming months. The big league club is still in first place in the National League East but have lost four in a row and seem less of a lock in that division than they did a week ago.

Twins Place Max Kepler On 10-Day IL

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The Twins announced they’ve placed outfielder Max Kepler on the 10-day IL with a hamstring strain. In his place, Trevor Larnach has been recalled.

It doesn’t sound like an overly serious issue for Kepler, and manager Rocco Baldelli seemed to indicate there’d be a good chance he’d be activated after the minimum number of days expired.

“It was w/ a cramp. He got an MRI & MRI seems OK. But he’s still pretty tight, & we don’t think he’s going to be able to play for a handful of days. If you can’t play for a handful of days … we’re going to IL him & get someone in here who can go,” Baldelli told reporters, including Dan Hayes of the Athletic.

Kepler’s posted a .212/.298/444 line this season with six home runs while manning right field. Larnach’s return is effectively a straight swap on the roster. He’s hit three home runs and posted a .221/.331/.356 line across 124 plate appearances this year, and should slot in as the team’s everyday right fielder with Kepler out.

AL Notes: Altuve, Rodon, Twins

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Astros second baseman and franchise face Jose Altuve is set to begin a rehab assignment this evening with the club’s Triple-A affiliate in Sugar Land. Altuve has been on the injured list all season after undergoing surgery on his right thumb after suffering an injury during the World Baseball Classic this spring. Though Altuve was initially expected to miss at least the first two months of the season, his rehab process gone quite well, allowing him to begin a rehab assignment somewhat ahead of schedule.

That’s great news for the Astros, who have scuffled to a 19-18 record in the early going this season, behind both the Rangers and Angels in the AL West. While Mauricio Dubon has filled in adequately at second base during Altuve’s absence, his .287/.306/.357 slash line in 134 plate appearances this season pales in comparison to the .300/.387/.533 line Altuve put up last season en route to the third top-5 finish in AL MVP award voting of his career. Houston is certainly hoping their 33-year-old superstar can jog a lineup whose .672 OPS as a team ranks bottom three in the majors.

More from around the American League…

  • Carlos Rodon has yet to throw a regular season pitch for the Yankees this season after signing a six-year, $162MM deal with the club this past offseason, but Jon Heyman of the New York Post provides some clarity on the lefty’s timetable for return. Heyman notes that with Rodon resuming throwing today after the cortisone injection he received earlier in the week, the 30-year-old figures to be six weeks away from his Yankees debut, should everything go according to plan. The sooner Rodon is able to return to the Yankees, the better, as the club has fallen to fifth place in the AL East with a 21-18 record to open the season. Rodon, who has posted a 2.67 ERA in 310 2/3 innings since the beginning of the 2021 season, would surely bolster a Yankees club that has been forced to rely on Clarke Schmidt, Jhony Brito, and Domingo German to fill out the club’s rotation behind Gerrit Cole and Nestor Cortes.
  • Twins reliever Ronny Henriquez has been reinstated from the 15-day IL and optioned to Triple-A, per the club’s communication director Dustin Morse. Henriquez, 23 next month, pitched to a 2.31 ERA in 11 2/3 innings of work with the Twins as a rookie last season, striking out just 18% of batters faced, though he generated an impressive 52.8% groundball rate. That being said, Henriquez struggled during his rehab assignment this season, with a 4.76 ERA in 5 2/3 innings during that time. Henriquez will look to get right in the minors on a more permanent basis going forward while acting as bullpen depth for the Twins alongside Josh Winder.

Tyler Mahle To Undergo Tommy John Surgery

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Twins right-hander Tyler Mahle will undergo Tommy John surgery, manager Rocco Baldelli announced to reporters Thursday (Twitter link via Do-Hyoung Park of MLB.com). Mahle, who’s scheduled to become a free agent at season’s end, will miss the remainder of the 2023 campaign and the early portion of the 2024 season as well.

It’s a brutal blow for a Twins team that traded three prospects to acquire the final year-plus of Mahle’s arbitration eligibility at last summer’s trade deadline. The 28-year-old Mahle has pitched well for the Twins when healthy, notching a 3.64 ERA in nine starts, but shoulder troubles limited him to just four appearances post-trade last year and he’s now done for the season in 2023 after just five starts. Given his impending free agency, it could spell the end of Mahle’s time with the team entirely — hardly what the front office had in mind when sending Spencer Steer, Christian Encarnacion-Strand and Steven Hajjar to Cincinnati in that swap.

There’s still the possibility that the Twins could try to work out some type extension that’d keep Mahle in Minnesota beyond the current season. They’ve previously shown a willingness to work out that type of deal with pitchers rehabbing from Tommy John surgery. Michael Pineda’s original two-year, $20MM free-agent deal with the Twins was signed knowing he’d miss the bulk of that first year recovering from a Tommy John operation. Minnesota also extended right-hander Chris Paddack — another trade acquisition who wound up requiring Tommy John — on a three-year deal earlier this year. Paddack won’t return until this summer.

Regardless of where things go with Mahle’s contract status, his injury leaves an unquestionable hole in the Twins’ rotation. Minnesota is deeper in starting pitching this season than at any point in recent memory, but Mahle will now join Kenta Maeda on the injured list. Right-handers Bailey Ober and Louie Varland began the season with Triple-A St. Paul and might well have been guaranteed rotation spots with many other clubs, given their 2022 success. They’ll both likely be locked into the Twins’ starting staff now, following a strong trio of Pablo Lopez, Joe Ryan and Sonny Gray.

Further injuries to the group could truly begin to test the Twins’ depth. Prospects Simeon Woods Richardson and Brent Headrick have had tough starts in St. Paul — though Headrick excelled in a brief big league look — and former top prospect Jordan Balazovic is just now moving back into a starting role after his 2022 season was ruined by a knee injury. Prospects Josh Winder and Cole Sands were rotation options last year in Minnesota, but both have been primarily working out of the bullpen in 2023.

As it stands, the Twins’ starting five still looks like a strong group. Ober has been brilliant in 2023 (0.98 ERA and 18 1/3 innings through three starts) and now boasts a career 3.51 ERA in 166 2/3 MLB frames. Varland has a 4.32 ERA through three turns and, paired with last year’s handful of starts in his debut season, carries a 4.01 ERA in 42 2/3 big league innings. The previously mentioned Paddack isn’t yet ready to join the group, but he’s nearing the one-year anniversary of his own Tommy John operation. He could be ready for a return mid-summer, and the team is also hopeful that Maeda can avoid a prolonged stint on the injured list — though they’ve not yet placed a hard timetable on his return.

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