MINNEAPOLIS — The Minnesota Twins placed starting pitcher Joe Ryan on the 15-day injured list on Friday with a significantly strained muscle in his throwing shoulder, an ill-timed setback entering a critical homestand against two division rivals and primary competitors for postseason spots.
Ryan has a Grade 2 strain of the teres major, a thick, flat muscle that runs from the shoulder blade to the upper arm, the Twins announced before beginning a four-game series against the AL Central-leading Cleveland Guardians. Manager Rocco Baldelli said Ryan would be sidelined for “weeks to months” but stopped short of declaring him done for the season.
The right-hander, who is 7-7 with a 3.60 ERA, 23 walks and 147 strikeouts in 135 innings over 23 starts, was removed from his most recent turn on Wednesday when he felt discomfort after throwing a pitch in the third inning.
“Yeah, it is a punch in the gut,” Baldelli said. “It’s going to need time to heal up, and he’ll do everything he can to get himself right and get back, but this is going to be a little while.”
Ryan will seek a second opinion before the Twins reveal a timetable for his recovery, but with a little more than seven weeks in the regular season the window is tight.
Starting pitcher Chris Paddack has been out for three weeks with a strained forearm, and his return is “not right around the corner,” Baldelli said, though president of baseball operations Derek Falvey added later that the right-hander was close to beginning a throwing program with the goal of returning for more regular season action.
The Twins, who ultimately passed on the high prices for starting pitching before the trade deadline last month, now have two rookies in their rotation indefinitely with David Festa and Simeon Woods Richardson trying to do their part behind Pablo López and Bailey Ober.
“When you get to a deadline and things don’t work out the way you want, you know you’re going to have to lean on your internal guys,” Falvey said. “We believe a lot of our internal group is capable of stepping into these roles and can play a role for us down the stretch.”
Louie Varland was recalled from Triple-A St. Paul to start the second game of the doubleheader on Friday against the Guardians, who took a 3½-game lead on the Twins in the division race into the series.
“You’re never going to be like, ‘We’re going to make a trade because someone is going to go down,’ or,…