While acknowledging that he doesn't want to see outfielder Aaron Hicks "dig too deep of a hole," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire still penciled the rookie and his .057 batting average at the top of the lineup on Friday against the Mets.
The first 35 at-bats of Hicks' major league career had mostly been poor, leading to concerns that a young player like Hicks could get in his own head and make things worse.
At this point, Gardenhire said he believes it would do more harm than good to move Hicks around in the batting order. Another factor: It's not like a year ago, when Ben Revere could lead off when Denard Span wasn't in the lineup. The Twins don't have appealing leadoff options other than Hicks when Hicks is playing center.
"I won't say there was no thought about it. We have kind of been mulling over everything," Gardenhire said. "We want to do what's best for our baseball team, and that would be for him to take off, get some hits and run with it.
"We want to protect him, too. We don't want to get him mired in here too deep. It's only 30-plus at-bats against some really good teams and the weather has not been conducive for anything. We're going to give him a chance to right himself."
Hicks said before Friday's game that he's trying not to press. He said he is going to continue to lead off games by working the count so his teammates can get an idea of what the opposing pitcher's stuff is like that day. Gardenhire suggested that Hicks might have to go after fastballs earlier in the count and hit his way out of his slump.
"Right now I'm just trying to enjoy playing ball," Hicks said. "It's a long season. This isn't going to be the only time I'm going to struggle. Just go about it every day as strong as I can and do what I can to help the team win."
Gardenhire also spoke with Hicks about the play on Wednesday on which Hicks did not run hard on a pop-up that was dropped. "You have to go hard from the get-go," Hicks said.
