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Byron Buxton singled to center off Mike Pelfrey on his final at-bat of Wednesday's game, but it was "a painful hit," Buxton said. That's because his left hand had been bothering him since his first at-bat, when the bat slipped away from him. He felt a sharp pain at the time, but "I paid no attention to it," he said, and kept playing; by the time he batted in the sixth inning, "it was throbbing pretty good," he said.

Update: Twins president of baseball operations Derek Falvey said the injury is a bone contusion, and that he should be available off the bench today for pinch running or fielding.

Buxton spent the morning undergoing a magnetic resonance imaging test. He said doctors thought the problem was near the hamate bone, at the base of his hand between the ring finger and pinkie. "I had never heard of a hamate until last night," Buxton said ruefully. Falvey said there was no indication the hamate bone was affected.

The Twins' center fielder, enjoying one of the hottest stretches of baseball in his career, was out of the lineup for Thursday's finale with the White Sox.

Meanwhile, the Twins will try to sweep Chicago, which could give them a couple of milestones: A victory would give them a 20-10 record in August, just the 10th 20-month in franchise history, and only the second since 1991. (They went 20-7 in May 2015.) If Bartolo Colon earns the victory, he would be 5-1 in August, just the third Twins pitcher in a decade, joining Ricky Nolasco in 2015 and Nick Blackburn in 2010, to win five games in a calandar month.

Come back to startribune.com for more updates.

Here are the lineups for today's noon matinee:

WHITE SOX

L. Garcia LF

Sanchez 3B

A. Garcia RF

Davidson 1B

Smith C

Brantly DH

Saladino SS

Hanson 2B

Engel CF

Gonzalez RHP

TWINS

Dozier 2B

Rosario LF

Mauer DH

Polanco SS

Kepler RF

Escobar 3B

Vargas 1B

Gimenez C

Granite CF

Colon RHP