You just never know who will take major league opportunities and run with them.

Exhibit A: Last week, Ron Gardenhire was close to making a move that would elevate Matt Tolbert to the everyday second base job, relegating Brendan Harris to the bench. Then Tolbert tore ligaments in his thumb on the last play of the game on Thursday, and Harris had a reprieve. The reprieve did not last long, however, because Alexi Casilla has taken Tolbert's spot, at least for the moment, to shore up the middle infield defense. And he's actually hit a little too, belting a three-run homer last night and gathering hits in his first two at bats tonight.

After he hardly hit at all for Rochester in April, nobody would have predicted that he would be the everyday second baseman for the Twins in May. Yet here he is, on the brink of breaking through as the everyday second baseman for the Twins.

Exhibit B: Carlos Gomez ended Friday's game in Colorado by making a game-saving catch and running into the center-field wall at Coors Field. He ended up with an assortment of bumps and bruises, the most serious of which was a strained right wrist that threatened to sideline him for up to a week. Along about Sunday night, rumor had it that Denard Span would get called up to replace the injured Carlos Gomez. This was Gardy's stated preference, but the front office must have talked him out of it because Gomez was closer to being able to play regularly than Gardy thought. He entered the game as a pinch runner on Monday night and ended up staying in the game to field a couple of balls in center, beat out an infield hit and score the winning run in the 13th. Then tonight, he led off the game with a triple and the first run and he was back.

Meanwhile Span broke his finger tonight on a bunt attempt and is expected to miss a month or more. In two games, he went from probable major league call up to AAA DL stint. Who knows when he will get another opportunity?

Ya just never know.