The Minnesota Twins will give Byron Buxton T-shirts to the first 10,000 fans who arrive for Saturday afternoon’s game against the Kansas City Royals in Minneapolis.
Whether any of those fans will see Buxton on the field is a question mark.
Buxton injured his right shoulder in the Twins’ 5-3 win over the Royals on Friday night, and his status for Saturday’s game is uncertain.
The four-game series is even at one win apiece; the Royals recorded an 8-6 victory on Thursday.
Minnesota rallied for the win on Saturday despite losing Buxton in the third inning. He crashed into the outfield wall while making a catch and stayed in the game but he was removed for a pinch hitter when his turn came up in the batting order.
The Twins said Buxton suffered a right shoulder contusion. He was removed from Friday’s game as a precautionary measure and was not scheduled to undergo any imaging tests barring any unforeseen changes.
“I think we’ll see how he is (Saturday),” Twins manager Derek Shelton said. “That’s the biggest thing. The fact that he jammed the same shoulder that he had issue with before, there’s always concern there. But how he comes in (Saturday) I think will be a good indicator.”
Buxton is batting .257 this season, with 18 homers and 28 RBIs.
Twins right-hander Joe Ryan (4-3, 3.20 ERA) is set to make his 14th start of the year. He has won his past two decisions, including his most recent outing Monday when he got the victory despite allowing four runs in eight hits in six innings in a 9-6 win over the Chicago White Sox.
Ryan has faced the Royals 12 times (all starts) in his career. He is 8-2 with a 2.58 ERA in those meetings and has 15 walks and 69 strikeouts in 66 1/3 innings.
Although he has fared well in his career against the Royals, Ryan struggled in his previous start against them this season. He gave up five runs on nine hits in four innings in a 13-9 loss on April 1 in Kansas City.
The Royals will counter on Saturday with right-hander Luinder Avila (1-2, 4.44 ERA), who has appeared in 11 games and logged two starts this season. The 24-year-old picked up his first win in his most recent outing Monday, when he held the Cincinnati Reds to one run on two hits in five innings in a 9-2 victory.
Avila has faced the Twins two times out of the bullpen in his career. He has not allowed a run in two innings and has walked one and struck out four without recording a decision.
Kansas City sits in last place in the American League Central, but players remain confident they can improve.
“We have a great clubhouse of guys in here,” Carter Jensen said. “Fighters. People who aren’t going to give up.”
Minnesota is 18-16 at home this season; Kansas City is 10-22 on the road.
–Field Level Media
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source fieldlevelmedia.com ’
