Twins receive good news on Byron Buxton; Louie Varland expected to start vs. Royals

Byron Buxton underwent a magnetic resonance imaging exam Tuesday, one day after the Twins center fielder exited a game with right hip discomfort, and it came back clean, the team announced.

After a tough week filled with bad injury news, the Twins finally received a good update. Buxton remains day-to-day after he was out of the lineup Tuesday, but the MRI result gives the club more confidence he can avoid a stint on the injured list.

“I don’t have anything to announce,” Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said in his pregame news conference Tuesday. “He is day-to-day right now. We’re going to see how he is later on this afternoon, how he is [Wednesday] and just go from there.”

Buxton, who had a season-ending right hip injury in 2022, has played in 90 games this season. He hasn’t played more than 92 games in a season since he played 140 in 2017.

Christian Vázquez appeared in three games during the Twins’ road trip through Arizona and Seattle at the end of June, but he accomplished a lot when he wasn’t at the ballpark.

Vázquez made trips to the data-based Driveline facility to work on his swing. He worked out at the facility last offseason, and he wanted to make an in-season visit to the facilities.

“When something is not working, you need to change it,” said Vázquez, who hit a solo homer to center in the fourth inning Tuesday off Kansas City’s Seth Lugo. “You need to find a way. It’s like when you’re in the game, you need to make adjustments on the fly, too. We did it with [assistant Twins hitting coach] Derek [Shomon] and it feels good.”

Since that West Coast road trip, Vázquez has a .344 batting average, five homers, four doubles and 13 RBI in 20 games.

Compare that to the first two months of the season when Vázquez hit .165 with two extra-base hits in his first 116 plate appearances. He credited Twins hitting coaches for working with him as he consulted Driveline and other hitting coaches.

“Nothing to lose, you know?” he said. “But it feels good. It feels like I can drive a ball anywhere.”

Louie Varland was in the Twins clubhouse Tuesday, signaling he will likely start Wednesday’s series finale against the Royals.

The Twins haven’t announced Wednesday’s starter, which will require a roster move to put Varland on the 26-man roster, but they had a choice between Varland and Bailey Ober after the pitchers threw last Friday in a doubleheader.

Amid a stretch of 14 games in 13 days, the Twins prefer to give their starters an extra day of rest between outings and Ober threw a career-high 106 pitches in his last start. Ober, who has a 1.76 ERA over his past nine outings, has yielded 18 hits and 14 runs in 6⅓ innings in his two starts vs. Kansas City this season.

Varland gave up three runs in 4⅔ innings against Cleveland last week.

• Pitcher Scott Blewett was designated for assignment to make room on the roster for starting pitcher Zebby Matthews. Blewett, who played in Taiwan last year, pitched a scoreless ninth inning in Monday’s victory over the Royals, his first major league appearance since Sept. 19, 2021. “A lot of people say you can only debut once, but that felt a lot more like a debut,” Blewett said Monday. “That was pretty cool. Pretty awesome.”

• Andrew Morris was promoted to the St. Paul Saints on Tuesday and gave up two hits and one run across six innings in his Class AAA debut, a 5-4 loss at Indianapolis. Morris, a source said, was the prospect opposing teams asked about the most when the Twins were in trade talks for a rental starter at the trade deadline.

• Reliever Brock Stewart underwent successful surgery on his right shoulder Tuesday. He’s expected to be healthy for spring training next year.