Minnesota Twins sink Chicago Cubs again, but Byron Buxton exits after being hit with pitch

The Twins won a game Wednesday night but lost All-Star center fielder Byron Buxton for the last seven innings of a 4-2 victory over the Chicago Cubs at Target Field.

Buxton was hit by a pitch from Cubs starter Cade Horton on his padded left hand — his non-throwing hand — while leading off in the home half of the first inning. He still stole second and scored from there for a 1-0 lead before medical personnel examined that hand.

Afterward, Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said imaging done during the game on Buxton’s hand “came back all right.”

“Obviously, Buck coming out of the game is not what you’re looking for,” Baldelli said. “It looks like he’s going to be OK. He was pretty sore, though, so we’ll see.”

Buxton left the clubhouse with a cup in his right hand and a wrap on his left.

“We’re good,” Buxton said. “We’ll be fine.”

Buxton wears protection on that hand because opposing pitchers often crowd him inside with pitches.

It was Buxton’s only at-bat of the night before he left the game after two innings and was replaced by pinch hitter Brooks Lee.

Buxton, 31, was voted into Tuesday night’s MLB All-Star Game in Atlanta, the second time he has made the July classic. He hit a home run in one of two at-bats for the American League in 2022 at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

He also has accepted an invitation to compete in Monday night’s Home Run Derby. Major League Baseball and the Twins announced after Wednesday’s first inning that teammate Joe Ryan has been added to the American League All-Star roster as a replacement player.

The ball that hit Buxton was at first ruled a foul ball, but the Twins challenged and the change to hit-by-pitch sent Buxton to first. He then stole second and scored from there with aggressive baserunning, taking off on contact on a two-out pitch.

Ryan Jeffers gave the Twins a 2-0 lead when he scored from first on Carlos Correa’s double to the right field wall.

Twins right fielder Matt Wallner led off the second inning with his ninth homer of the year, 390 feet to right with none on and no outs.

The Cubs made it 3-2 by scoring two runs in the fourth, but the Twins answered by working a double-steal play that didn’t work when they tried it against Tampa Bay in the previous series.

This time, Wallner let himself get caught up between first and second, allowing Royce Lewis to score from third in the fourth inning for a 4-2 margin.

BOXSCORE: Twins 4, Cubs 2

MLB standings

The Twins’ David Festa (3-3) made his ninth major league start this season and went 5⅓ innings, allowing three hits and two runs with three strikeouts and two walks before a parade of relievers — Danny Coulombe, Brock Stewart, Louie Varland and Jhoan Duran — came on. Duran earned his 14th save on a night when nobody but Festa allowed a run.

“David Festa had a nice day out there,” Baldelli said. “He threw 5⅓, and four of those innings he was as crisp as can be. And in the inning where he had to work a little bit and lost the strike zone a little bit, he found it and was able to keep us in a good spot. He had everything working.”

The game was played in 2 hours, 20 minutes on a beautiful summer’s night, before 33,470 announced fans. Many of them were Cubs fans following their NL Central first-place team.