MINNEAPOLIS-- The sputtering Minnesota Twins shelved another regular on Friday, placing first baseman Miguel Sano on the 10-day injured list with a strained right hamstring.
Sano is batting .111 with two home runs and 20 strikeouts in 45 at-bats. Shortstop Andrelton Simmons, right fielder Max Kepler and left fielder Kyle Garlick are three of the five players currently on Minnesota’s COVID-19 injured list.
Infielder Travis Blankenhorn and catcher Tomas Telis were also returned to the team’s alternate training site. Outfielders Alex Kirilloff and Tzu-Wei Lin and infielder Nick Gordon were promoted to fill the open roster spots.
Kirilloff, one of baseball’s top prospects who made his debut in the playoffs last year, can also play first base. Lin signed with the organization before this season. He has played in 101 career games, all with Boston. He’ll be the first Taiwan-born player in Twins history.
Gordon was another one of the club’s past first-round draft picks, going fifth overall in 2014 ahead of Aaron Nola, Michael Conforto and Trea Turner. The son of former major league pitcher Tom Gordon, he has yet to appear in the major leagues.
His rise through the system hit some snags, starting in 2018 when he was diagnosed with gastritis, or stomach inflammation. Other injuries came in 2019. Then he caught COVID-19 in 2020, right before teams reconvened for summer camp following the pandemic pause.
The call from Triple-A manager and alternate training site supervisor Toby Gardenhire took Gordon by surprise, as he walked with his sister to Target to buy ingredients for dinner.
“He was like, `Hey, we’ve got something important to tell you.’ I was like, `Oh, man. I hope I didn’t do anything wrong.’ He was just like, `No, you’re going to the big leagues,”’ Gordon said. “It was crazy. I needed a moment. It was just a lot of feelings, just knowing that I’ve been through a lot.”
