FORT MYERS, FLA. - Luke Hughes, a stocky infielder from Perth, Australia, continues to muscle his way into the Twins' Opening Day roster discussion.
Hughes is competing with Matt Tolbert and Trevor Plouffe for a utility infield spot. The other two might be better defensive options, especially up the middle, but Hughes is separating himself with his bat.
Hughes, 26, smashed a two-run double Thursday in the first inning off Blue Jays starter Jesse Litsch. The ball short-hopped the left-center field fence. He's batting .370 (10-for-27) with two doubles and leads the team with three homers and 10 RBI.
"He's a strong kid," manager Ron Gardenhire said. "We've seen him hit the ball pretty far. He played a little ball this winter [in Australia and Venezuela], which probably gave him a little leapfrog coming in here. It looks like he's kind of ahead of the curve, as they say."
Tolbert is batting .167, and Plouffe is batting .211, though neither has had more than 20 at-bats.
Nathan's rollingJoe Nathan tossed his fourth scoreless inning of the spring in Thursday's 7-4 loss to Toronto, with his fastball hitting sitting at 90-91 miles per hour, just a few ticks lower than he was before having reconstructive elbow surgery.
"We've seen the velocity pretty much stay consistent," Gardenhire said. "Whether it gets better or not, we don't know, but it's pretty good where it is."
Lineup scratchesRain delayed Thursday's game for 70 minutes, and rather than risk injuries on a wet field, the Twins scratched Delmon Young, Tsuyoshi Nishioka and Jim Thome from the lineup.
