Let’s enjoy the haziness that is Byron Buxton of the Twins while we can

The 2013 Glendale Desert Dogs of the Arizona Fall League could field an alumni team that could qualify for the wild-card round of the 2024 playoffs.

The former Desert Dogs would certainly end up with the White Sox.

The starting lineup is said to include Marcus Semien, Cory Seager, Tucker Barnhart, Eddie Rosario, Max Kepler and Byron Buxton. You may have to bring pitchers like Trevor May and Alex Meyer out of retirement for the bullpen, but Chris Bassitt, Michael Lorenzen and Andrew Heaney could be three starters for a wild-card series.

“I had just been drafted that year and was still trying to figure out pro ball,” said Colby Suggs, a pitcher on that team and now the Twins’ bullpen coach. “There was a lot of talent on that team and that was the first time I saw ‘Buck.'”

That would be Byron Buxton, who would turn 20 on December 18, after the Fall League ended.

“What a freak athlete; the sheer speed he played at, and the energy,” Suggs said. “He was skinny then, but still strong. I remember one game, he saved me with a diving catch that was amazing.”

That was Buxton’s second season in the professional league, after being selected second overall by the Twins in 2012, just behind shortstop Carlos Correa who went to Houston.

Buxton and Correa both topped the Midwest League in 2013, with Buxton being named Minor League Player of the Year by Baseball America.

He was named Mike Trout’s successor in Cedar Rapids, where the Kernels had moved from Angels to Twins that season.

Buxton was the fourth-youngest player among the six AFL teams. The Astros did not send Correa.

There were a couple of Reusses on a baseball vacation. The Desert Dogs lineup for a few days had Buxton in the middle, with Rosario at second base and Kepler at both first base and in the outfield.

We went back to watch the All-Star Game and Buxton did not play due to a strain in his left shoulder. This would be the moment to suggest that the unexpected absence was predictive of Buxton’s career to come.

I’ll let the cheap comment pass, though, because now that we’re 30, we’re getting to see a Buxton that some of us — perhaps most of us — thought we’d never see again.

The greatness came in periods. He was the Platinum Glove winner in 2017 as the American League’s best defenseman. Five years later, he was a first-time All-Star and hit a 425-foot home run for the American League.

That game was on July 19, 2022. His season ended on August 1 due to a knee injury that required surgery.

The Twins’ solution was to use Buxton exclusively as a designated hitter in 2023, which was no solution at all. The best part of Buxton had always been his defense in center field.

He could no longer play in the field and, as a designated hitter who struck out many batters, did not get on base often to show his speed.

I’ve never been of the opinion that Buxton was an athlete who got injured too easily. He was a football star as a running back in high school, so that’s the end of the story.

The problem was, this latest knee injury was going to be chronic, right? This would be the final blow to one of the most “what-could-have-been” careers in Twins history.

Except today, and for a few weeks now, we have seen the long-awaited Buxton.

Another knee operation was required and from the start of spring training it was a matter of center fielding or forgetting for Buxton and the Twins.

He didn’t hit much to start and was sidelined for two weeks in early May. It could happen again if the knee swells, but he’s hitting .282 and getting extra-base hits, and that doesn’t even begin to challenge the pessimistic views about Buxton’s future in March.

The deer that Colby Suggs and those other desert dogs saw 11 years ago… he can now fly.

The other day I was watching TV (yes, that’s possible):

A run was scored from third base as a base hit was caught, and in the background – walking around second base, heading for third base – Buxton was covering the 90 feet in about 10 miraculous steps.

Buck is back, maybe not forever, maybe not tomorrow, but let’s cherish those wheels. Because whether they’re used in the gaps or on the bases, they’re unmatched in 64 seasons of Twins baseball.