MILWAUKEE – The countdown to the arrival of Ervin Santana is on.
Santana on Tuesday will make the final of his three scheduled starts at Class AAA Rochester. That will put him on line to start July 5 at Kansas City. So the Twins have one week to figure out how to weave Santana into the rotation as the veteran righthander returns from an 80-game suspension for a positive steroids test.
Will someone be demoted to the bullpen or Rochester? Will the Twins try a six-man rotation? They could go to a six-man rotation, giving Santana two starts, until the All-Star break then reassess things.
"We have not finalized anything yet, but we have certainly talked about it," General Manager Terry Ryan said. "We haven't gotten that deep into it because it usually takes care of itself and we will see how that goes. We have until about July 5 to worry about it. We will probably take our time."
Baseball works in mysterious ways. Sometimes when a team is contemplating a roster move, something happens — injury, trade, etc. — that frees up a spot. That's what Ryan meant when he spoke of things taking care of themselves.
But a couple of the current members of the rotation could ensure their immediate future with strong outings. Trevor May, for instance, lasted only one-third of an inning Friday.
Gibson rebounds
Twins righthander Kyle Gibson got 13 ground ball outs in Saturday's 5-2 victory over the Brewers, when he pitched into the seventh inning to improve to 5-6 on the season, his first victory in six starts.
He ran into trouble in the third inning when leadoff hitter Jean Segura reached second on shortstop Danny Santana's two-base throwing error. But Gibson stranded Segura on second. Gibson then threw first-pitch strikes to seven consecutive batters — and he needed just six pitches to get through the fifth.