MLB Tonight examines the Twins!

MLB Tonight discusses the possibility of Byron Buxton returning to the outfield, Carlos Correa and Twins outlook heading into 2024.

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Now, let’s talk about what’s going on with the Minnesota twins. Byron Buxton at their fan fest asked about playing center field. Remember he was just ding last year. I want to keep him on the field still at work. He said, oh yeah, I’m back. Yeah, Byron Buxton says I’m back playing center field.

Interesting. Again, one of the best defensive baseball players in the sport, the problem is he’s been injury prone to what level? It’s incredible. He’s played nine seasons in the big leagues. Carlos Byron Buxton has played more than 92 games once, one time. This is just, I mean, there’s

Only one way, one word to explain all this. It’s just frustrating, frustrating for him, frustration all the way around for the team. But this is actually a good move. I like to hear buck and say, you know what, I’m gonna go play center field. I mean, we, we tried just, uh

Being a DH and it didn’t work. I still got hurt. You know what? I’m gonna continue to work on my body. I’m gonna do everything I can to be healthy, but I have to go out there and do what I do. He is a superb outfielder. Most athletic, one of the most

Athletic guys. I, you know, I’ve said it before. He might be the most athletic guy in all of baseball. It’s just that we don’t see him play on a consistent basis when , you know, you said 90 games. I mean, come on, I mean, he really needs to find a way to

Stay healthy because I’m telling you this guy’s MV P caliber when he’s healthy. Yeah, that’s frustrating right there. I mean, we’ve been down this road, carlos, I’ve had tons of injuries too, but when you’re talking, you know, hamstrings, knees, hamstring, it’s always something it seems like. And for Byron Buxton, all he

Wants is health. This game is tough enough to play when you’re not healthy to see Buxton when you go back to 2017 and he played 100 and 40 games. You’re talking gold glove, you’re talking MVP votes, you’re talking maybe the best athlete in the game, the baseball. So nobody wants to play more

Games than Byron Buxton. I love that. He’s back there in center field. I just think that makes that defense and that pitching staff so much better. So, I mean, he’d like to get, at least if you can get 100 and 30 games out of him. That would be incredible.

He’s only played over a 100 games one time. Um, you know what Brian Cashman said that, unfortunately, injuries are part of Giancarlo Stan’s game. So like we, we can’t assume we have to stop assuming we’re gonna get any close to a full season from Stanton. Unfortunately, Byron Bucks is in the same category.

So you might be sitting there going, why are they gonna have him play center field if he’s injury prone? Well, you d HD him, he was still injury prone. So, I mean, you gotta stop, you take the, the, the, the, the, the, the training wheels off now just he’s gonna be injured.

It’s, it is what it is. The cake is baked or, or perhaps , no, I tell you what, perhaps not like that. That’s, that’s my point. I mean, I, I perfectly understand what’s happened over here. You know, the history pretty much tells it all, but right there, that’s the right attitude.

I mean, man, you know what, go out there, we gotta let you go, let the horse run and whatever happens happens. But, you know, as long as you get him out there, you know, they got their fingers crossed, he’s gonna stay healthy. And if he does, we know that

It’s extremely, I, I know I sound negative about it, but you have to be realistic about it. If you’re, if you’re getting ready for a twin season, you have to Byron Bucks is going to be on the A L for a good chunk of the season. You just have to, the facts are

What they are, look at the back of his baseball card as for Carlos Correa, he plays his two seasons in Minnesota’s played over 130 games each year. This is what he said on his last season struggles. Quote, I’m not going to blame my offensive struggles on injury.

It was more than that, but this year I’m going to show up healthy, ready to go, Sean. His average went from 291 in 2022 all the way down to 230 in 2023. That’s not Carlos Correa. No, led the majors two grounded into double plays. No, no, this isn’t. Carlos Korea.

I think he had, you know, the plan of fas is never a great injury. But also too, you were talking about his back kind of jacked up sometimes it’s those kind of years what I do respect about what Carlos Correa did. He showed up for his teammates and he posted when you’re in

That clubhouse and you’re out on that field and you cross those white lines and you can look over and say Carlos Correa hasn’t been good all year, but he did play 100 and 35 games. He did show up for the Minnesota twins and, and, and, and they had the year that they had.

So sometimes I look at it like this, Carlos Correa at 70% is gonna be better than anyone else. We can bring up at 100% if he does play a full year and Buxton somehow is healthy with Royce Lewis if he can stay healthy at third base. This kid julian who’s now the

Second baseman for them because he was outstanding when he got a chance to play with Polanco injured. You look at the Minnesota Twins. I like this lineup. I think this lineup. If things click the right way, carlos, they should be able to drive in runs. Don’t sleep on Matt Walner, by

The way, he could be. Baseball’s next Matt Olson. That’s how much slug is in that guy. What do you think of this lineup? And also don’t forget about Max Kepler because one of the nicest swings from the left side and I believe that he also is due to really have a breakout season.

Now it’s all about everyone performing up to their potential , right? I mean, at the end of the day, obviously, we just talked about Carlos Correa not performing to his potential. We’re talking about bucks and not performing to his potential. How about the entire lineup? Alex Kirillov too. Go ahead.

Let’s just say not career years. Just everyone playing up to their potential. Now you have a lineup to score a bunch of runs. So everybody has to win. Everyone has to answer. It’s a sum of all parts. It’s not just one player, there’s definitely a ton of potential in that line.

Like I said, Karlo, but I, you know, with Lewis, I wanna see, get him 100 and 45 games. I bet you, he puts up superstar numbers. We’ll see what happens with the rotation. We love Lopez, we love Joe ryan Bailey over the 6 ft nine right hander. Pretty good stuff.

He had an, er, a under four last year. Delani will probably go into the fourth slot and Then you have Chris Paddock who they’re hoping to put together a full year. We’ll see what happens in the