{"id":1391,"date":"2025-07-17T00:35:08","date_gmt":"2025-07-17T00:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/1391\/"},"modified":"2025-07-17T00:35:08","modified_gmt":"2025-07-17T00:35:08","slug":"byron-buxton-im-a-minnesota-twin-for-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/1391\/","title":{"rendered":"Byron Buxton: “I’m A Minnesota Twin For Life”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Twins center fielder Byron Buxton<\/a> is in the midst of the finest season of his career, having been named to the All-Star team (and selected to compete in the Home Run Derby) after hitting .289\/.351\/.574 with 21 homers and 17 steals through 78 games (333 plate appearances). With the Twins underperforming as a whole and the team facing payroll constraints, some fans have hoped and wondered whether Buxton might become available via trade. The outfielder put any such talk to bed at this week\u2019s All-Star festivities.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got a no-trade clause,\u201d Buxton said after being asked about the possibility of perhaps someday playing for his hometown Braves (link via Phil Miller of the Minneapolis Star Tribune<\/a>). \u201cI\u2019m a Minnesota Twin for the rest of my life. That\u2019s the best feeling in the world, knowing when I walk into the clubhouse every day, it\u2019s going to say Twins. I love Minnesota \u2014 that\u2019s home. \u2026 I don\u2019t want to play anywhere else. The team, the people, the city \u2014 they made me who I am and made me a part of it there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Buxton\u2019s no-trade clause was a known element of his contract, but it\u2019s hardly uncommon to see players waive their no-trade protection. There\u2019s no such consideration for the 31-year-old Buxton, it seems.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re at the midway point of Buxton\u2019s seven-year, $100MM extension with Minnesota. That contract bought out Buxton\u2019s final year of arbitration eligibility and locked in six free-agent seasons at $15MM annually. The on-field results have been excellent thus far, with the former No. 2 overall pick hitting .250\/.321\/.516 with 84 homers, 39 steals and plus center field defense so far \u2014 save for the 2023 season, when he was limited to DH work due to ongoing knee troubles. (He underwent a second knee surgery following that season.)<\/p>\n

The caveat with Buxton, of course, is that said production has come in a limited capacity. He\u2019s long stood out as one of the game\u2019s most talented but also most frequently injured players. Some of that stems from the reckless abandon with which he plays defense, but Buxton has suffered injuries on all sides of the game over his career. He\u2019s only reached 100 games played in a season on two occasions and has only once accrued more than 400 plate appearances in a season.<\/p>\n

The frequency of Buxton\u2019s injuries played a role in dictating the unique nature of his contract. He\u2019s being paid $15MM per year from 2023-28 but can boost that number all the way to $25.5MM based on plate appearances and MVP voting in any given season. The contract pays Buxton a $3MM bonus if he finishes between sixth and tenth in MVP voting, $4MM bonus for finishing fifth, $5MM bonus for finishing fourth, $6MM for finishing third, $7MM for second and $8MM for winning an MVP Award. He also receives a $500K bonus for reaching each of 502, 533, 567, 600 and 625 plate appearances in a given season.<\/p>\n

So far, those incentives have yet to come into play, although he\u2019s well on his way to locking in some extra earnings in 2025 if he can remain on the field. Buxton ranks sixth in the American League in WAR, per Baseball-Reference, and is tied with Houston\u2019s Jeremy Pena<\/a> for seventh in FanGraphs\u2019 version. He\u2019s been on an absolute tear of late as well, hitting .343\/.408\/.741 with 11 homers over his past 120 plate appearances (including a five-hit game in which he completed the cycle in the penultimate game of the season\u2019s unofficial first half).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Twins center fielder Byron Buxton is in the midst of the finest season of his career, having been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1392,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[1993,49,48,462,82],"class_list":["post-1391","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-byron-buxton","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1391","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1391"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1391\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}