A few hours before Tuesday night’s game against the Atlanta Braves, Twins third baseman Royce Lewis was out taking ground balls in the infield — a regular occurrence. But this time, he was stationed on the other side of the infield.

Lewis has begun to take groundballs at second base, something he said he has done just a handful of times. He may see game action there. He may not.

“I would never close a door by saying no, it’s not going to happen,” manager Rocco Baldelli said. “But it’s also far from a guarantee that we’ll see him in any games at second base this season. I think it’s a possibility. I would say that.”

Lewis has minimal experience at the position. He has worked primarily at shortstop and third base since he was drafted by the Twins in 2017. He also has gotten a taste of the outfield.

He has just one game of minor league experience at second that came in 2019, plus four games there in the Arizona Fall League the same year. So, the experience is pretty new to him.

“(It’s) totally different,” Lewis said. “It’s like if I were to bat righty and then one pitch later, go bat lefty.”

Lewis said learning to turn double plays would be the toughest part of the position, while noting that the shorter throws were a slightly easier element of second base.

Right now, he said, he’s just trying to get comfortable, put in the work and see what happens over there.

“If you take a baby out of its crib where it’s safe, it’s going to feel a little bit scared,” Lewis said. “That’s kind of where I’m at right now.”

But with more reps, he expects to feel more comfortable there. And even if the Twins, who are currently without injured infielders Carlos Correa and Brooks Lee, don’t play him there in a game, they think there’s a benefit to him getting his feet wet at second base.

“Truthfully, I think getting him some work over there can also help him mix up some of his throwing angles and different types of throws he has to make,” Baldelli said. “I think changing your eye line and sight line can sometimes help you with the position that you are playing. I think some of the work he’s putting in, it’s good for him to go over there and get those reps at second base. But also I think it can help him with his work at third, too.”

Ryan out for regular season

Joe Ryan has yet to start throwing a baseball since suffering a Grade 2 teres major strain on Aug. 7.

While the Twins did not say the starter wouldn’t pitch again in the regular season, they did transfer him to the 60-day injured list to clear a 40-man roster spot, which rules him out for a potential return late in the regular season.

Ryan said Tuesday his shoulder feels really good and that he has been “crushing the legs” and “getting good cardio in” so that if he were able to return in the postseason, the rest of his body would be ready.

“I don’t want there to be other things that are wrong or have to take more time to get back into the groove,” Ryan said. “Trying to mentally stay locked in and, yeah, we’ll see where it takes us.”

The good news, Ryan said, is that he has talked to others who have had a similar injury and they’ve suffered no longer-term effects. He received a second opinion on his shoulder, which confirmed the first one. This injury aside, everything else in his shoulder, he was told, looked great.

“I think in the long term, it’s … not really going to be an issue,” he said. “I’m confident in what we’re going to do here.”

Briefly

The Twins claimed reliever Michael Tonkin off of waivers for the second time this season. He is expected to be added to the active roster on Wednesday. … The Twins also selected the contract of Caleb Boushley and designated for assignment reliever Trevor Richards, their only trade deadline acquisition this season. Richards walked 11 batters and threw seven wild pitches in 13 innings after being acquired. “He still can do a lot of good things with the baseball, but he struggled with his command here,” Baldelli said. “It would not be honest to just ignore that point. It’s true. But I think you just sometimes have to make a challenging call.”  … Starting pitchers Simeon Woods Richardson and Spencer Schwellenbach made a unique bit of history on Tuesday. Statistics website Baseball Reference posted on X (formerly Twitter) said the pair formed the longest last name starting pitching matchup in its database.

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