The long layoff for Twins prospects Byron Buxton and Miguel Sano appears to have affected the two highly-touted prospects at the start of the season.
A nagging wrist injury and a concussion limited Buxton to 31 minor-league games last season, while Sano missed the whole year while recovering from Tommy John Surgery in March.
The cavalry may not be coming to Minnesota from Double-A for a while. Byron Buxton is hitting .196 and Miguel Sano is hitting .189 early on.
— Aaron Gleeman (@AaronGleeman) April 22, 2015
Despite their struggles, both have had a few moments for the Twins Double-A team in Chattanooga. Buxton was 4-for-6 in a game last week, while Sano hit a grand slam for the Lookouts.
Today’s Knuckleball suggests the Twins call up Buxton, despite his struggles anyway.
“However, his performance from prior seasons in the minors indicate the struggles won’t last too long. He has a .295 batting average and .859 OPS with 22 home runs, 116 RBI and 73 stolen bases over four minor league seasons.”
The blog notes that the Twins have just one starting outfielder hitting over .200 and suggests that Buxton couldn’t be any worse than the players who are already receiving regular with the Twins.
The expectation at the start of the season was the pair of 21-year-olds would be headed for Minnesota at some point in 2015, and according to the Star Tribune, that remains a possibility after they knock off some rust.
Meyer puts together a strong outing
Twins’ top pitching prospect Alex Meyer also was off to a slow start, but he put together a strong outing earlier this week.
After walking 11 batters in his first 8 2/3 innings of work, Meyer threw six shutout innings against Syracuse in the first game of a doubleheader. In the game, Meyer gave up just two hits and walked three, while striking out 11.
“It sounds like he threw the ball well,” Twins Assistant General Manager Rob Antony told the Star Tribune.
Here’s an example of how tough he can be to hit.
https://twitter.com/ParkerHageman/status/590916792253448192
