It’s been an up and down season for the Twins top prospect, Byron Buxton. Up to the bigs, down to the minors. His performance has been up and down too: up in the minors, down in the bigs. Now that Minnesota is mired in a 13-game losing streak and sport the worst record in the majors, however, they have made the wise decision to call him up and let him figure it out at the major league level.
Buxton was sent down in early August after hitting .193/.247/.315 over 218 big league plate appearances. In 188 at-bats with Triple-A Rochester, however, he has hit .309/.362/.574. There are such things as AAAA hitters -- guys who crush it in the minors but just can’t do it in the bigs -- but Buxton is too young and too talented to be categorized thusly. It makes total sense for the Twins to make at least a little lemonade out of this lemon of a season. And maybe that’ll be Buxton.