Twins pitcher Chris Paddack comes up short against former teammate Colin Rea

Chris Paddack figures he owes Colin Rea a lot for his help in navigating Tommy John elbow ligament replacement surgery and rehab a decade ago. So he’s willing to put up with the needling he knows is coming from his former teammate after the Twins’ 8-1 loss to the Cubs on Thursday.

“I’m disappointed in myself, because now he has a little bit of leeway for giving me a hard time,” Paddack said after he gave up six runs in five innings while Rea limited the Twins to one run over seven. “He threw the ball really well. It was cool to watch. Even though it’s an opposing jersey, I’m always rooting for that guy.”

In fact, Paddack now owns that opposing jersey, after he and Rea traded them on Wednesday, souvenirs to remind them of their time together on the Padres injured list.

“He had a huge impact on my career, from 2015 all the way to 2019,” Paddack said.

That career has had some good times and bad, and Paddack has experienced both this season. On Thursday, he gave up 11 hits, five of them on balls hit 100mph or harder.

“There was just a lot of contact in general today — whether it was 105 [mph] or 75, it was falling,” Paddack said. “My stuff wasn’t wipeout stuff today, but I kept battling and kept my head up. I tried to keep us in the game as long as I could.”

His manager credited the Cubs’ gameplan against Paddack, who considers himself a strike-thrower above all else.

“They were ready to handle heaters and they were ready to handle heaters with ride up in the zone,” Rocco Baldelli said. “I’m sure if he had to face them again next week, Paddy would make some real adjustments going into the game and you’d see a different pitcher the next time.”

His next time, actually, will come July 18, when the Twins’ season resumes in Denver vs. the Colorado Rockies. Paddack likes how the first half went, despite the 3-8 record and 4.95 ERA.

“I’m at 100 innings for the first time in my career before the All-Star break. I’m healthy,” he said. “I have some things I need to sharpen up, for sure. I’ve got to find the swing-and-miss. I want to get some better strikeout numbers the second half.”

Until then? “I’m going to enjoy going back home [to Texas] for a couple of days, see the cows, see the family, and get ready for the second half,” Paddack said.

See the cows? Well, it’s not as sentimental as it sounds for the Twins’ rancher. “I call them Sirloin and Ribeye,” he said with a smile.

Byron Buxton didn’t play Thursday, one day after being bruised by a pitch that struck his left hand. But Baldelli said the All-Star center fielder isn’t seriously injured.

“He’s doing fine. He’s definitely sore, and for the same reasons he came out of the game yesterday, he’s not starting the game today,” Baldelli said. “We’re just going to continue to evaluate him and get him treatment. … We were just going to get him a day [off] and see if we can get him ready for tomorrow.”

• Royce Lewis on his two-hit day, which raised his batting average to a season-high .227: “It’s nice to see the ball fall. This game is crazy. Carlos [Correa] had two really good at-bats, hit balls hard up the middle, and they both were outs. That’s [the approach] we preach. [Ryan] Jeffers had hard-hit balls as well. To see those be unsuccessful today, it’s a bummer. But the game can swing around.”

• Marco Raya struck out seven in six innings, Pierson Ohl earned a three-inning save and the Saints beat Iowa for the third day in a row, winning 2-1 at CHS Field. Edouard Julien homered in the first inning and Will Holland had a tiebreaking sacrifice fly in the fifth.