Twins protecting healthy start by asking Tigers to disinfect visiting clubhouse

_{File photo from Target Field}
The Twins are taking all the necessary precautions to keep their hot start going.

Several reports out of Detroit and Boston Monday night said the Twins called ahead to Comerica Park, where they arrive Tuesday for a three-game series with the Tigers, to have the visiting clubhouse disinfected.

The sickly Boston Red Sox spent the past four days in the clubhouse and the Twins don't want to catch the same bug. Several Red Sox players, members of the coaching staff, and even the team's play-by-play announcer have been fighting the flu and other viruses the past two weeks.

Outfielder Andrew Benintendi was vomiting in the sixth inning Saturday in Detroit, but managed to stay in the game. Play-by-play announcer Dave O'Brien, however, had to leave the booth midway through the game because he was too sick to continue.

At least six players including Hanley Ramirez and Mitch Moreland have been hit with the sickness. Robbie Ross Jr. was placed on the disabled list with the flu.

"There's three different viruses, they tell me, going along," Red Sox president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski told NESN Monday. He added that the locker room at Fenway Park had been fumigated multiple times already.

Boston Herald writer Michael Silverman wrote Sunday "The Red Sox are in sick, sick shape, and that makes it impossible to make an accurate read on their state of play four games into the season when the entire team has become unwitting cast members of "The Walking Near-Dead," a queasy crew of coughing, vomiting, sniffling, sneezing, hollow-eyed, surgical mask-wearing zombies.

"Their lineup and pitching staff are in tatters and on IVs."

Along with the deep cleaning, expect several family size bottles of antibacterial hand sanitizer to be around the clubhouse in Detroit.