{"id":84978,"date":"2024-09-05T15:32:18","date_gmt":"2024-09-05T19:32:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/?p=84978"},"modified":"2024-09-05T15:32:18","modified_gmt":"2024-09-05T19:32:18","slug":"max-kepler-knee-injury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2024\/09\/05\/max-kepler-knee-injury\/","title":{"rendered":"AL Central Contender Suffers Outfield Blow at Bad Time"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Minnesota Twins have placed outfielder <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/k\/keplema01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-09-05_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Max Kepler<\/a> on the 10-day injured list due to patellar tendinitis in his left knee. This unfortunate development for Kepler has paved the way for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/register\/player.fcgi?id=keirse000das&amp;utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-09-05_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">DaShawn Keirsey Jr.<\/a> to receive his first-ever call-up to the big leagues from Triple-A St. Paul. In a corresponding move, left-hander <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/f\/fundeko01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-09-05_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kody Funderburk<\/a> has been shifted to the 60-day IL to create space for Keirsey on the team&#8217;s roster. At 31 years of age, Kepler has been batting .253 with eight home runs and 42 RBI in 105 games this season, representing his tenth consecutive season with the Twins.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-media-max-width=\"560\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">&#8220;Well he can&#8217;t play. So, I mean, that&#8217;s why we&#8217;re going to do this.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Rocco Baldelli talks about Max Kepler heading to the IL.<a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/MNTwins?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">#MNTwins<\/a> | <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Audra_Martin?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@Audra_Martin<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/BWmW8GuhgC\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/BWmW8GuhgC<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Bally Sports North (@BallySportsNOR) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BallySportsNOR\/status\/1831733412572635252?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">September 5, 2024<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Max Kepler Hits IL with Knee Injury<\/h2>\n<p>Kepler came out of the All-Star break hitting .316\/.357\/.468 in 84 plate appearances. It was enough to boost his season line to .273\/.320\/.412 along the way. However, he&#8217;s been swinging a cold bat of late, tallying one hit in his last 17 plate appearances. He even sat out the last four games due to knee discomfort, missing the series against the Tampa Bay Rays.<\/p>\n<p>Keirsey, 27, has yet to make his major league debut. He hit .292 with 14 home runs and 75 RBI with the Saints. He will factor into a depleted outfield group with Austin Martin and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/h\/helmami01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-09-05_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Michael Helman<\/a> out with injuries. Funderburk, 27, has not pitched since July 12. He went 1-0 with a 5.61 ERA and one save in 26 relief appearances before landing on the IL.<\/p>\n<h3>A Double Dose of Bad News<\/h3>\n<p>In the other half of Minnesota&#8217;s injury news, outfielder <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/b\/buxtoby01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-09-05_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Byron Buxton<\/a> appeared to be on track to rejoin the roster. That is on hold after Buxton was not only ejected from his Wednesday rehab game but reported an additional right hip soreness. <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/dohyoungpark\/status\/1831705999117328627\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>MLB.com&#8217;s<\/em> Do-Hyoung Park reported<\/a> that it&#8217;s too early to tell how long Buxton will be out, who was originally on the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2024\/08\/15\/twins-byron-buxton-injured-list-hip\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">IL with hip inflammation<\/a>. The Twins will have to play the waiting game for now, especially after no meaningful updates on shortstop <a href=\"https:\/\/www.baseball-reference.com\/players\/c\/correca01.shtml?utm_medium=linker&amp;utm_source=lastwordonsports.com&amp;utm_campaign=2024-09-05_br\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Carlos Correa<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo: \u00a9 Brad Rempel-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Minnesota Twins have placed outfielder Max Kepler on the 10-day injured list due to patellar tendinitis in his left knee. This unfortunate development for Kepler has paved the way for DaShawn Keirsey Jr. to receive his first-ever call-up to the big leagues from Triple-A St. Paul. In a corresponding move, left-hander Kody Funderburk has [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3686,"featured_media":84979,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13,1071,35],"tags":[660,716,28438,511],"class_list":["post-84978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-twins","category-mlb","category-news","tag-byron-buxton","tag-carlos-correa","tag-kody-funderburk","tag-max-kepler"],"modified_by":"Matt Graves","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3686"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84978\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/84979"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}