Royce Lewis spent Monday morning at the State Fair, walking a calf named Doodles and eating corn dogs, cookies, sweet corn and performance-enhancing doughnuts.
He followed his visit to the Great Minnesota Get-Together by gathering a large group of people at home plate. Again.
On Sunday, Lewis hit a grand slam that started a comeback from five runs down and led to a 13-inning victory over Texas. On Monday, he hit a grand slam that gave the Twins a two-run second-inning lead and led to a 10-6 victory over Cleveland at Target Field and a seven-game lead in the American League Central Division.
Lewis became the first Twin ever to hit grand slams in consecutive games and the first rookie to hit multiple grand slams in a season since Danny Valencia in 2010.
“It’s so much fun,” Lewis said. “This team is so special, and just to crack the team and be part of it is special.”
On Monday afternoon, former Twins General Manager Terry Ryan visited the Target Field press box. He revitalized the franchise in the 2000s by cultivating a group of young, athletic position players.
In 2023, Lewis is the headliner of another group of young, athletic position players who have revitalized this team.
Lewis is a rare combination of talent, intelligence and charisma. Edouard Julien immediately became one of the Twins’ best hitters and has improved, week by week, as a second baseman. Matt Wallner is what the Twins had hoped Joey Gallo would be — a big, talented athlete who gets on base often enough to make him valuable even between his long home runs.
Lewis, Julien and Wallner have the three highest on-base-plus-slugging marks on the roster of an almost certain division winner. Before the All-Star break, the Twins ranked 24th in runs scored per game. Since the break, with the kids producing, they rank seventh (and that was before Monday’s explosion).
Through five innings Monday, Julien, Lewis and Wallner were a combined 4-for-6 with a walk, a hit by pitch and two home runs.
Lewis, befitting his gregarious nature, went to the fair on Monday after visiting Vikings camp the previous week. He hadn’t planned on walking a calf, but when asked, he grabbed the leash. (This might be the first time in two years that the word “calf,'” in a story about the Twins, was not accompanied by the word “strain.”)
“I’ve talked about what young legs do for a team,” Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. “They do, literally, good things. Because they’re actually young and lively and springy, and they run around and dive and can stay on the field more than some of the more veteran guys.
“Figuratively, they bring the energy, they bring these other benefits that are hard to quantify, but they keep you young, whether you’re a staff member like myself or a veteran player. They keep you going and keep you on your toes and keep things fresh. Truthfully, when they’re productive, like they have been, they bring you more wins, too.”
Suddenly, a team that was saturated with starting pitching and desperate for hitting for much of the season has to worry about rotation depth.
On Sunday, Bailey Ober allowed five runs in four innings, continuing a stretch of decreasing effectiveness. On Monday afternoon, the Twins optioned him to Class AAA St. Paul and called up reliever Kody Funderburk.
On Monday, starter Kenta Maeda, coming off two iffy starts, allowed four runs in the second inning, during which six of the seven batters he faced hit the ball hard, and six runs in four innings overall, ballooning his ERA to 4.69 and causing Baldelli to bring in Funderburk for his big league debut.
Funderburk played at Dallas Baptist, following in the footsteps of Twins legend Lew Ford. In 2018 at the school, Funderburk hit .304 and had an ERA of 6.84. On Monday night, he became the latest Twins rookie to make a difference.
Lewis could reward him with a cookie from the leftovers he brought from the fair. “I eat what makes me happy,” he said, after feasting on an appetizing curveball.