Twins-Guardians series preview: Pitchers, injury report, TV-radio

The Guardians (81-71) are a season-high 10 games over .500 and have a seven-game winning streak after a three-game road sweep of AL Central-leading Detroit. The Guardians, who finished the sweep with a 3-1 victory Thursday, trail the Tigers by 3½ games — after trailing the Tigers by 12½ games on Aug. 25. They are two games behind in the wild-card standings. ... The Guardians are in a 17-game stretch of games against AL Central opponents. They are 30-14 against the AL Central this season. … The Guardians are 41-23 since July 6, when they were eight games below .500 (40-48). Their seven-game winning streak is the longest active streak in MLB. … The Guardians pitching staff has a 1.53 ERA (23 earned runs in 135 innings) in 15 games since Sept. 3. The Guardians allowed six runs in the sweep of the Tigers. … José Ramírez hit his team-leading 29th home run in the series finale Thursday. He is hitting .282 with 80 RBI. Ramírez has 157 hits (10th in the AL). … OF Steven Kwan is eighth in the AL with 159 hits. He is hitting .272 with 20 stolen bases. … LHP John Means (UCL surgery) is on a rehab assignment with Class AAA Columbus. He is expected to make a rehab start Friday and could be activated after that. … OFs Lane Thomas (right foot plantar fasciitis) and Will Brennan (Tommy John surgery) and RHPs Nic Enright (elbow/forearm inflammation) and Andrew Walters (right lat surgery) are out.

The series will conclude the home portion of the regular-season schedule for the Twins (66-86) after they went 1-2 in a series against the New York Yankees. The Twins won the series opener 7-0 on Monday behind Woods Richardson. It was the Twins’ first shutout victory over the Yankees since 2008. The Yankees won the final two games of the series, which ended Wednesday, 10-9 and 10-7. … The Twins are 3-6 against the Guardians this season — 2-5 in Cleveland and 1-1 at Target Field. A rainout May 20 at Target Field is being made up in Saturday’s doubleheader. In the most recent meeting between the two — Aug. 1-3 — the Guardians won two of three. Six of the nine games between the teams have been decided by one run. The Twins are 15-26 in one-run games this season. … The Twins are 10-20 against lefthanded starters. … The Twins are 38-41 at Target Field this season. … OF Byron Buxton has 504 plate appearances this season, seven shy of his career high, set in 2017. He has played in 117 games this season, his most since his career-high 140 in 2017. … C Christian Vázquez (left shoulder infection) started a rehab assignment with the Class AAA Saints this week. C Ryan Jeffers (concussion injured list), RHPs David Festa (right shoulder inflammation) and Justin Topa (left oblique strain), LHP Anthony Misiewicz (left pectoral strain) and OF Alan Roden (left thumb sprain) are out. … The Twins close out the season on the road with three games Sept. 23-25 at Texas and three games Sept. 26-28 at Philadelphia.