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David Levine -> RE: Twins 2024 Season and Game Day Thread (4/2/2024 12:21:27 PM)
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KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Royce Lewis participated in a rigorous leg-based program this offseason designed to strengthen his tendons. It didn’t matter.
Saturday, the Minnesota Twins placed Lewis on the injured list with a “severe” right quadriceps strain that could sideline him for several months, according to team sources.
At a minimum, the Twins plan to rest the young star for a month before reassessing. Lewis suffered the injury running the bases in the third inning of Thursday’s season opener after homering in his first at-bat and singling in his second trip.
It’s the third major injury for Lewis since 2021 and means he’ll miss significant time for a fourth straight season after having his 2020 minor-league season wiped out by COVID-19.
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Though Lewis has played only 77 games in his career, he is already a force at the plate. Including the postseason, Lewis has homered 26 times in 308 plate appearances, a Babe Ruth-type start.
The No. 1 pick of the 2017 MLB Draft has the type of talent that repeatedly lifted the Twins down the stretch in 2023 while Byron Buxton was on the injured list and Carlos Correa slumped through a season in which he played through plantar fasciitis. As good as they feel about their depth, the Twins know replacing Lewis won’t be easy.
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What’s particularly frustrating for the Twins is the amount of work Lewis put into strengthening his legs in the offseason. The team devised a plan for Lewis, and he implemented it. As he went through spring training, Lewis said he felt “like a true athlete.”
“We talked about a lot of isometrics, which is tendon health,” he said. “I felt like we did a great job with running plyometrics, which is, like, jumping, single-leg hops, two-leg hops. … It’s kind of one of those things where there’s nothing I would have done different. It’s a play where every single baseball player would look to score. Especially a ball down the line, I don’t think I would have changed (anything) I would have done. Just another freak deal.”
https://theathletic.com/5380000/2024/03/30/twins-royce-lewis-injury-return-timeline/
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