Two-year-old Lucas Rosario was in the clubhouse this morning with a glove and a baseball, playing catch with Jorge Polanco. "He's a lefty?" I asked Lucas' dad, Eddie, after watching a few throws. Rosario smiled and said, "We don't know yet. Watch."
Sure enough, a couple throws later, the toddler, having dropped his glove, put it back on the other hand and started throwing right-handed. His dad just shrugged.
Maybe versatility runs in the family. Eddie Rosario will serve as the Twins' cleanup hitter for the first time in his career this afternoon, the result of Miguel Sano's continued absence from the lineup due to a sore hand. Rosario said his move into that spot won't change anything about how he approaches hitting against Texas righthander Nick Martinez, and that's what manager Paul Molitor wanted to hear.
"Another day, another lineup," Molitor said of his 96th different batting order on the season. "It's a different look. Like every day, it shouldn't matter too much where you hit. Guys shouldn't dwell on that. You should just try to do what you do and don't try to be somebody you're not."
In this case, nobody can be Sano, the Twins' most fearsome hitter, who will sit out his second straight game after being hit on the hand by a pitch on Friday. The hand is still sore, Molitor said, and it's likely that Sano will be sent for another round of X-rays, just to make sure that the swelling on Friday didn't obscure a bigger problem in the hand. But the Twins don't expect to find anything, and Molitor said at the moment, they're not contemplating putting him on the disabled list.
The Twins, who have managed only 29 hits in five August games and been held to four or fewer three times already this month, still could salvage a split of the four-game series and win the season series with the Rangers with a victory today. Jose Berrios, who allowed only one run on two hits over seven innings in his last start, is on the mound for Minnesota, facing Martinez, who gave up seven runs in his most recent outing.
Here are the lineups for Sunday's game:
RANGERS
