Brandon Warne

It’s steamy with nary a cloud in sight as the Minnesota Twins look to complete a three-game sweep at home against the Los Angeles Angels. A pair of righties will tangle as recently-named All-Star Ervin Santana takes on Parker Bridwell. More on that in a bit. Miguel Sano got ready for his upcoming trip to Miami for the All-Star Game and Home Run Derby by putting a number of balls -- at least three which I saw -- into section 332 during pre-game BP. That’s not a misprint -- he hit them to the 300 level, and not anywhere close to the foul pole. Those are some mammoth blasts. Related: He’ll face Mike Moustakas in the first round of the derby next week. Brian Dozier is back in the lineup after missing a pair of games with back issues. He’s leading off and playing second base, and said he was feeling a lot better as he made his way through the clubhouse after taking some early hitting. “We saw a lot of improvement yesterday, I know he went through a lot of treatment just to make sure he did everything he could to get that back as loose as possible,” said manager Paul Molitor of Dozier. “He took some swings and did some pregame work, so he should be fine. Here’s how the Twins will attack Bridwell: Please click through to Zone Coverage here to see the rest of this entry.

Here’s a blanket statement that on the surface probably won’t surprise anyone: History is not on Kyle Gibson’s side. We aren’t talking about his ERA coming into the game, though that could have doubled as the prefix of a Twin Cities-area phone number. We aren’t even talking about his numbers since coming back from Rochester, though his ERA was approaching 5.00 with an OPS against of over .900 since returning from his exile. Rather, we’re talking about Gibson pitching on July 4 — something he had done twice prior to drawing the task again in 2017. Gibson’s second career start came on July 4, 2013, and he was absolutely pummeled by the Yankees, allowing eight earned runs on 11 hits in 5.1 innings in a 9-5 loss — the first of his big-league career. That included giving up multi-hit games to such luminaries as Zoilo Almonte, Luis Cruz, Travis Hafner, Ichiro Suzuki and the post-apocalyptic version of Vernon Wells. The next year, Gibson again drew the start against the Yankees at Target Field, and this time didn’t record an out in the third inning in a 6-5 loss. The final line: six runs, five earned, six hits, no strikeouts and a walk. This time, Gibson threw 52 pitches and got just one swinging strike against a Motley crew including Brian Roberts, Kelly Johnson, Zelous Wheeler and Brendan Ryan. The opposing starter was Chase Whitley. Sam Deduno took over after Gibson departed. But Tuesday afternoon was different, as Gibson pitched into the seventh inning for the first time all season in a 5-4 win over the Los Angeles Angels. In fact, the last time he recorded an out in the seventh inning prior to Tuesday was his final start of last season — a 6.1-inning outing in which he fanned eight Royals on the way to a 7-6 Twins win. Please click through to Zone Coverage to read the rest of this story here.

Greetings and happy Fourth of July from Target Field! It’s overcast and warm as the Twins prepare to take on the Los Angeles Angels in game two of a three-game set. The Twins beat old friend Alex Meyer and the Angels 9-5 on Monday night to open the series and improve to 42-40 on the season. The Royals also won on Monday night, so the teams remain deadlocked for second place -- 2.5 games behind division-leading Cleveland. Also of note: the Angels sent Meyer to Triple-A prior to Tuesday’s game. According to Pedro Moura of the Los Angeles Times, it’ll likely be an extended demotion. Not only does Los Angeles not need Meyer with the All-Star break looming, but with a number of off days scheduled over the next few weeks, he’ll get some work in down on the farm. Moura tweeted that the Angels don’t need a fifth starter again until July 29. As for Tuesday’s game, it’ll be righty Kyle Gibson going for the Twins against J.C. Ramirez for the Angels. More on that in a second. Brian Dozier remains out of the lineup for a second straight day with back soreness. Dozier texted manager Paul Molitor Tuesday morning to say that he could play, but the skipper wanted to err on the side of caution with such a quick turnaround from Monday, when he could barely swing at all. The expectation is that Dozier will return to the lineup in a full capacity in Wednesday’s series finale. Dozier is available off the bench, he said. As a brief injury update, Molitor also said that left-handed pitcher Glen Perkins is still just playing catch as he works back from biceps tendinitis which has waylaid his comeback from shoulder surgery. He remains without a timeline. Here’s how the Twins will line up against the Angels: Please click through to ZoneCoverage.com here to read the rest of this story.

No. Any ball that makes contact with the foul pole is fair.

In the third inning of the Minnesota Twins’ 8-1 loss to the Kansas City Royals at Kauffman Stadium on Friday night, Brian Dozier hit a long foul ball to the right field corner on a 1-1 pitch from Royals starter Jason Vargas. It was initially ruled foul, and manager Paul Molitor asked for a review. After the review, the call was upheld due to inconclusive evidence to overturn the call. Well, how is this for evidence? Luke Thomas appears to be a recent graduate of Missouri State University in Springfield, having studied Socio-Political Communications according to his Facebook page. https://twitter.com/BrianDozier/status/880999860773810176 See this post in its entirety on ZoneCoverage.com here.

Yes, I should have been more clear on that. 40-man players use options when sent back at end of spring. So when they make the move, it'll be "recalled" even though he has no MLB experience.

Yes Yes Around $3,000

As the Minnesota Twins were in the process of losing to the Boston Red Sox 6-3 on Thursday night, word broke that the team had honed in on who’d make one of the starts in Saturday’s doubleheader in Kansas City. It’ll be righty Felix Jorge, who’ll be making his big-league debut, and making the jump from Double-A Chattanooga. The move was first floated by Mike Berardino of the St. Paul Pioneer Press early Thursday: The move was then reported by Mariana Guzman, who covers the Twins for La Raza 95.7 FM — the Spanish language broadcast that features Tony Oliva on its telecasts. That move was further confirmed by Berardino just minutes later: The Twins have not confirmed the move, but that’s not atypical of this sort of thing. Most likely, Jorge — who is already on the 40-man roster — will serve as the 26th man on Saturday before being sent back to the minors. The 26th man rule is a provision that came into being with the ratifying of the Collective Bargaining Agreement following the 2011 season. The player must be on the 40-man roster, and the game must be scheduled at least 48 hours in advance. The player does not need to be a pitcher — though it almost always is — and can be added inside the 10-day waiting period for a player previously optioned. However, if a player is used with that provision, they must be immediately sent back to the minors. Any other player promoted can be kept up in the big leagues with another player taken off the roster. Read this article in its entirety at ZoneCoverage.com here.

News broke Thursday afternoon that Twins infield prospect Nick Gordon had been selected to play in the 2017 All-Star Futures Game at Marlins Mark on July 9, 2017. Gordon, who has spent the whole season at Double-A Chattanooga, is the only player who’ll represent the Twins at the game. The Futures Game — which was first played at Fenway Park during the 1999 All-Star break — was created to showcase top-end minor-league talent, and is separate from All-Star Games at each level. As one might expect, there have been some truly great talents represented at these events. Alfonso Soriano — then a member of the Yankees organization — was the first MVP of the game, with Jose Reyes, Grady Sizemore, Billy Butler, Nick Castellanos, Joey Gallo, Kyle Schwarber and Yoan Moncada winning the award over the last 17 years. Twins outfield prospect Rene Tosoni won the MVP in 2009. View this post in its entirety at ZoneCoverage.com here.

The older I get, the less I like most things. Thank you for reading!

He's not really the kind of guy you have to make room for, as the article states. He's a complimentary piece.

While it’s still in the air whether he’ll be voted to start the All-Star Game — voting ends at 11:59 p.m. ET Thursday — there have been reports that Miguel Sano will be taking place in the Home Run Derby at Marlins Park on Monday, July 10. Gomez lists himself as the editor of Z101, a verified account on Twitter whose bio says it is the “station with the largest circulation in the Dominican Republic.” A post from that site dated one week ago lists Gomez as winning a prestigious award for his work in 2016. Jon Paul Morosi, who reports on MLB for Fox Sports and MLB Network has piggybacked the report, which would seem to lend additional credence to its legitimacy. Morosi, who is well-versed in Spanish, traveled to Cuba before the 2016 season with Barack Obama, John Kerry and Derek Jeter for a good-will trip which was a “historic week of communication, civility and baseball.” To view this post in its entirety, please click here.

Oh, didn't address where he'd hit. He'd probably play more left field than anything, and would probably hit eighth or ninth.

As a trickledown I would imagine it takes at-bats from Polanco, Rosario and Buxton mostly.

By now you’ve probably heard that the Minnesota Twins have an outfielder who is setting the world on fire down at Triple-A. His name is Zack Granite, and he’s a jack-of-all-trades as far as outfield defense is concerned, and he’s hitting a robust .371/.423/.516 in 54 games between Triple-A Rochester (49 games) and High-A Fort Myers (five games). He’s not just stellar in the batter’s box, but he’s stolen 119 bases over five season in the Twins system at a success rate of 73.4 percent. The success rate is a little lower than one might like, but he’s gotten increasingly better in recent years, stealing 73 bases over the last season-and-a-half at a success rate of 79.3 percent. Depending on the run environment in the big leagues year-to-year, a good success rate is somewhere in the vicinity of 75 percent, so he checks off that box. But this year’s offensive outburst is way, way out of character for the 24-year-old outfielder. That’s even more true when considering he was hitting just .259/.303/.339 coming into June. That’s right; in 27 games this month, Granite is hitting an unheard of .486/.541/.697 with 11 doubles, three triples, two home runs and 13 walks against 15 strikeouts. His BABIP for the month is an unconscious .554! He’s got more than one hit in 20 of the 27 games he’s played in this month. But part of bringing Granite up now is to capitalize on that hot stretch. He’s already on the 40-man roster, basically is who he is and isn’t likely to be ruined by being “rushed” as a player who’ll turn 25 by season’s end. He can also help the Twins right now. Kennys Vargas is hitting just .234/.264/.426, and as a bat-first — or perhaps more accurately, bat-only — player with limited access to playing time, he’s really not helping the team that much. His role is even further diminished when considering Eduardo Escobar has been so hot lately that he’s taken more playing time at third base, with Miguel Sano seeing more time at DH. Even if that doesn’t continue, it still probably means more of Escobar at DH or shortstop, and a shuffle which trickles down to less time for Vargas on the field. Read the rest of this article on ZoneCoverage.com here.

He's just picking on me. Hi Ryan!

The balloting for MLB All-Star teams ends this Thursday at 11:59 p.m. Eastern, and fans can vote up to five times every 24 hours — up to a total of 35 ballots. The results will be announced on a television special on ESPN at 7 p.m. on Sunday, July 2, and the game will be played at Marlins Park on July 11. So, who do we think should be on the rosters for each side? We’ve cut through all the red tape for the final balloting and just made sure we had each team represented by at least one player. We also went starting pitcher heavy — they’re more valuable than relievers due to sheer innings thrown — but we won’t quibble if others prefer to load up on relievers to get through the late innings of a potentially great clash between the senior and junior circuits. I listed my roster with Jon Becker of Roster Resource and MLBDailyDish.com on Tuesday’s recording of Midwest Swing — available here — but did make a change after our discussion. So here it is, my final version of who’d be on my 34-man roster if the game were to be played today: AL Starting Lineup C- Salvador Perez, Royals 1B- Logan Morrison, Rays 2B- Jose Altuve, Astros 3B- Jose Ramirez, Indians SS- Carlos Correa, Astros LF- George Springer, Astros CF- Mike Trout, Angels RF- Aaron Judge, Yankees DH- Corey Dickerson, Rays SP- Chris Sale, Red Sox — Bench Lorenzo Cain, Royals Justin Upton, Tigers Miguel Sano, Twins Avisail Garcia, White Sox Mookie Betts, Red Sox Jonathan Schoop, Orioles Francisco Lindor, Indians Alex Avila, Tigers Gary Sanchez, Yankees Ben Gamel, Mariners Yonder Alonso, A’s Xander Bogaerts, Red Sox The rest of this post can be found here at ZoneCoverage.com:

I'm confused. Why are we talking about a two-game stretch for a guy who was jumping from Double-A? It's clear he's talented.

He's got a 101 wRC+, has already walked more than last year and it probably requires some faith in one-year defensive stats to really bury him. I don't think he's in any imminent danger. He makes too many boneheaded plays, as I tweeted multiple times during the Indians series, but I don't think Zack Granite is a threat to steal his starting spot. Granite is the kind of guy you bring up as the fourth, and let him earn that kind of playing time based on how he plays in short bursts.

Max Kepler hits the ball in the air. Christian Yelich does not.

That bullpen wasn't very good, either. Pitching staff had -- OTOH -- a 4.63 ERA, and the bullpen's was 5.11. Only one team was worse!

I'm sure people are upset about this, but meh. It's a dart throw on a guy who doesn't throw hard, but has pretty good offspeed stuff. Was really good as recently as two years ago. Whatever. I don't hate it.

That team had two Ervin Santanas and at least one less "round" to contend with.

He's not far from 35, has thrown a ton of sliders, is on a reasonable deal and is on an overachieving team. Set your price. If it is met, move him. If it isn't, ride the deal out. It's that simple. The only real qualifier is if the Twins are 5-10 games up in July. In other words, this will not happen.

He made a business decision. He's going in the top three picks -- most likely -- and that's $7 million he could lose (or rather, have on the table and never see). I don't blame him. It's very rare that anyone could make this decision with the margin for error only being about a million bucks (slots 1-3 difference in value).