The Minnesota Twins will begin the season with Jorge Polanco and Alex Kirilloff on the injured list. The Twins announced that Kirilloff, who is recovering from surgery on his right wrist, and Polanco, who is dealing with left knee soreness) won’t be ready to go for the March 30 opener against the Kansas City Royals.
Twins manager Rocco Baldelli indicated that Polanco was close to being ready, but they’re moving forward with caution.
“He’s still trending the way we want,” Baldelli told Twins beat reporter Do-Hyoung Park. “If spring training was a little bit longer, I think we would be having a different discussion. [He] has made steady progress, but just not fast enough with the time we had. We actually realistically thought he may be ready for Opening Day, but we just need to keep him going in the right direction.”
Kirilloff will stay in Fort Myers for extended spring training.
“I think we’re definitely still in that boat where we don’t want to rush into anything like that and we want to make sure that I play as many games this year at 100% as possible,” Kirilloff told Park. “So we’re just kind of taking every step possible right now to get to that point.”
“I feel like I’m getting closer,” he added.
It’s not clear yet who will replace Polanco and Kirilloff in the starting lineup, but Kyle Farmer, Nick Gordon or Donovan Solano are the favorites to start at second base and Trevor Larnach, who went 4-for-4 with a home on Wednesday, looks like a lock to start at first base.
Minnesota could also choose to move Jose Miranda to first base and start Farmer at third, which would allow flexibility in the outfield thanks to Larnach’s versatility.
So the season-opening lineup could look something like this…
- C: Christian Vazquez
- 1B: Trevor Larnach
- 2B: Kyle Farmer
- SS: Carlos Correa
- 3B: Jose Miranda
- LF: Joey Gallo
- CF: Michael A. Taylor
- RF: Max Kepler
- DH: Byron Buxton
If Zack Greinke is KC’s starter on Opening Day, Minnesota could roll out a batting order something like this…
- Max Kepler, RF
- Byron Buxton, DH
- Carlos Correa, SS
- Joey Gallo, LF
- Jose Miranda, 3B
- Trevor Larnach, 1B
- Kyle Farmer, 2B
- Christian Vazquez, C
- Michael A. Taylor, CF
