Kenta Maeda returns for the Twins Friday night
Fresh off back-to-back thrilling wins over the Boston Red Sox, the Minnesota Twins got more good news Friday morning with starting pitcher Kenta Maeda being reinstated from the injured list.
Maeda was placed on the injured list in late April due to arm soreness. An MRI revealed no structural damage so the team treated the injury like a muscle strain. After nearly two months, he's scheduled to take the mound Friday when the Twins open a weekend series against the Tigers in Detroit.
Maeda has made four starts for the Twins this season. He left his first start on April 4, which was his first big league game in 591 days after recovering from Tommy John surgery, due to a tired arm. And then in his third start this season he was hit in the shin by a line drive that left the bat of Boston's Jarren Duran at 111 mph.
He then gave up 10 runs in three innings to the Yankees before the Twins decided to put him on the injured list.
Maeda finished second in American League Cy Young voting in 2020. If the Twins get anything close to that version of Maeda, he'll further bolster what has been one of the league's top starting rotations this season.
Entering play Friday, Twins starters have a 3.70 ERA, which ranks fourth in the majors.
Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen. His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011. Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play. Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers. Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.