ST. PETERSBURG, FLA. – Miguel Sano won't be taking any bus rides across the Eastern seaboard with the Rochester Red Wings, at least for now. After igniting a weekend of speculation about their cleanup hitter's pending demotion, the Twins decided that Byron Buxton's difficulties at the plate require more urgent attention than their issues with Sano's work ethic.
Besides, interim General Manager Rob Antony said, Sano seems to be taking steps to correct the behavior that got him nominated for a minor league stint in the first place.
And any lingering doubt may have been erased Sunday afternoon when Sano bashed two home runs in the Twins' 6-3 victory over Tampa Bay.
"We believe he understands that nothing is guaranteed to him," Antony said. "He's a young player who has had some issues, and he's working hard to address the concerns that we've had, and hopefully that continues."
It will continue in the major leagues for now. Trevor Plouffe homered and doubled Saturday in the last of his five rehab games with Rochester, and he returned to the Twin Cities on Sunday. He will be activated before Monday's game with Houston, and Buxton, 6-for-46 (.130) since the All-Star break, will return to the Class AAA team.
Sano was one of a handful of candidates whom Antony and manager Paul Molitor considered demoting to make room for Plouffe, especially since a recent hitting slump and rash of errors was sometimes paired with a perception that the 23-year-old slugger could be indifferent to working on his craft or nonchalant about his mistakes. Molitor even benched Sano three times in a six-day span in late July, and while the manager didn't explicitly cite that as a reason, he also declined to rule out a demotion for Sano when asked during the week.
Molitor said he regretted that Sano had become "a hot-button topic," however. "He got singled out, maybe unfairly, in my mind. But he's had a good week," Molitor said of the slugger. "His at-bats have been getting better. Starting in Cleveland, he started taking a few more walks, and now he's squaring balls up. He's gained a lot of confidence."
Just in time, perhaps. Now that Plouffe has fully recovered from a fractured rib, Molitor and Antony said they agreed that Sano is making progress. "Sometimes the lessons are a little harder and sometimes it's not going to be perfect for anybody," Molitor said. "He's committed, I think, to us and the staff and his teammates that he's willing to do what he needs to do to keep himself here and keep himself playing at a high level."
It didn't hurt, either, that Sano ended his home run drought this weekend by bashing a long home run on Friday and two more on Sunday, including the three-run clout that carried the Twins to victory on Sunday. "I'm not worrying about [the possibility of demotion]. It's not in my control," he said. "I'll just keep working hard and hustling."
Now the concern is for the Twins' other highly rated prospect. Buxton, sent down April 25 after starting the season in a 7-for-45 hole with 24 strikeouts, is hitless in his last 10 at-bats, with 80 strikeouts in 63 games. When he returned from Rochester in late May, he appeared to have revived his offensive game, going 10-for-23 that first week, but he hasn't had a two-hit game in more than a month.
"I feel like I made progress from where I was," Buxton said. "I'm probably just thinking too much. Especially if I get off the game plan, my mind starts thinking too much and I end up rushing my swing."
"He just needs to get consistent at-bats to try to get his swing going and his head straight," Antony said. "He's better than this, and he just needs to get back the confidence necessary to show that."
With the Twins headed for another 90-loss season, it could be argued that there's no harm in letting Buxton get those at-bats in the major leagues. But the Twins don't agree; for one thing, Molitor said, it would be unfair to the rest of the team, which is trying to win as many games as possible.
It's for his own good, too, the manager said. "You can get to a point sometimes where you can continue to go backward before you go forward," Molitor said. "We want to nip that in the bud and try to get him on track with less pressure."
Added Antony: "We're not trying to let a guy sink and drown. He's just 22. His struggles are not unprecedented; it's just that he's been such a highly touted prospect, it gets a little more magnified than a younger player."
