Minneapolis, May 19, 2026, 11:03 CDT
- Minnesota sits third in the AL Central at 22-26, trailing Cleveland by 4-1/2 games as it tries to keep pace in the division.
- Lewis holds a .163 average and a .540 OPS—on-base plus slugging—so far.
Royce Lewis, the Minnesota Twins’ former No. 1 overall pick, is headed to Triple-A St. Paul after struggling out of the gate, according to MLB.com, which cited a source Tuesday. The team hasn’t announced the move or said who will take his spot on the roster.
This is significant: Minnesota isn’t out of it, but the lineup can’t afford to slump. The Twins went into Tuesday sitting third in the AL Central, trailing the Cleveland Guardians and Chicago White Sox. Detroit and Kansas City are right on their heels.
This is the second week in a row Minnesota has shipped out a young player pegged for its lineup. Just five days after demoting outfielder Matt Wallner, KSTP reported, the team optioned Lewis—who’s had trouble on defense as well, racking up five errors.
Lewis, 26, is batting .163/.261/.279 so far this season, according to CBS Sports, striking out in 31.1% of his 119 plate appearances. MLB’s player page shows three home runs, 13 RBIs, and a .540 OPS across 104 at-bats.
Things went south fast once Lewis got back from the injured list in April. Since his return, he’s posted a .132/.189/.191 line, striking out 25 times in 74 trips to the plate, according to MLB.com.
Twins manager Derek Shelton wasn’t hiding his worries. “He’s grinding a little bit, maybe a bit of overswinging,” Shelton told The Athletic, per WCCO. “There’s a situation where guys, they don’t have their A swing, and they try to overswing to do too much.” Audacy
Dan Hayes, The Athletic’s Twins reporter, told WCCO effort isn’t the issue here. “It’s not like Royce is just doing nothing,” Hayes said. Still, the results haven’t followed the work. According to Hayes, Lewis is “striking out more than ever for his career.” Audacy
Defensive mistakes kept piling up, forcing the issue. According to WCCO, Lewis went down on strikes three times Sunday facing Milwaukee, then got pulled late for a pinch-hitter. The day before, he let a simple double-play ball slip away, a play that opened the door for the Brewers to knot things up in a game Minnesota dropped 2-1.
No tidy fix for third: the Twins are sorting through options. Tristan Gray should see more reps, according to CBS Sports. Over at St. Paul, Orlando Arcia is putting up a .318/.376/.556 line, KSTP noted, but he’s not on the 40-man roster, so Minnesota faces a roster move if they want to bring him in.
It’s not just Lewis’s schedule that’s coming into play for Minnesota. The Twins notched a 6-3 victory over Houston on Monday, with Josh Bell going deep twice—his pair of home runs helped seal their sixth win in nine games. Still, Reuters reported Byron Buxton was sidelined again, missing his fifth consecutive game because of hip soreness. Over at MLB.com, there was another hit: catcher Ryan Jeffers left Monday’s game with a sprained left wrist.
But there’s risk in the reset. If Lewis’ swing issues come down to confidence, mechanics, or lingering effects from those knee injuries, Triple-A at-bats might not do the trick right away. And if Gray, Arcia, or any other fill-in fails to deliver, Minnesota will have swapped out a high-upside bat without settling the infield question.
Lewis knows the drill, but this time, it’s different. Taken first overall by Minnesota in 2017, he broke into the majors in 2022, flashed star potential in 2023, only to see his OPS slide to .671 last season, according to CBS Sports. His production hasn’t bounced back to the .825 OPS he registered through his initial 152 big-league games.
