Tommy Milone threw a light bullpen today to make sure he felt fine before taking his turn in the rotation on Thursday against the Rays. He threw 12 pitches today, the same amount he threw in the 12th inning on Sunday to get the save in the Twins' win over Baltimore. So he's good to go in two days.

``I just pushed them together for one long bullpen session," Milone joked.

The Twins are deciding what to do with Blaine Boyer as we speak. The righthander is ready to come off of the disabled list after recovering from elbow soreness. Twins manager Paul Molitor said Boyer threw free and easy and his pitches were sharp. Boyer could join the Twins here, but Molitor pointed out that rosters can expand Tuesday. Boyer could pitch in a couple games at Class AAA Rochester to make sure he's good to go. If they decide to activate him now, whoever gets sent out could be right back in a few days..

By the way, conversations are ongoing about who deserves September call ups. I would expect Michael Tonkin and Aaron Thompson to be brought back. Maybe A.J, Achter. Definitely Eric Fryer. The rest is hard to figure out. Kennys Vargas, Molitor said, has had consistently good at bats, which helps his cause. Oswaldo Arcia has been terrible of late. Danny Santana has been so-so. And I'm starting to get the sense that Jose Berrios will not be called up. He threw 140 innings last season. The Twins don't want to increase a pitcher's workload more than 20 percent. so 168 would be his cap.

Well, Berrios has thrown 148.1 innings with a couple starts to go for the Red Wings. The Twins might not want to press it, unless they let him pitch out of the bullpen.

Look for Joe Mauer to have a big series. He has a carer .371 batting average against Tampa Bay, the best all-time against the Rays. That includes a .406 batting average with a .508 on base percentage at Tropicanan Field, his highest batting average at any park he's played at least 25 games in.


Twins

Byron Buxton, CF
Brian Dozier, 2B
Joe Mauer, 1B
Miguel Sano, DH
Trevor Plouffe, 3B
Eddie Rosario, LF
Torii Hunter, RF
Kurt Suzuki, C
Eduardo Escobar, SS

Ervin Santana, RHP

Rays

Grady Sizemore, RF
Desmond Jennings, LF
Evan Longoria, 3B
John Jaso, DH
Logan Forsythe, 2B
Adrubal Cabrera, SS
James Loney, 1B
Kevin Kiermaier, CF
Curt Casali, C

Nathan Karns, RHP