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The other shoe has dropped; Minnesota has outrighted Jason Wheeler. This afternoon the Twins announced their first wave of September callups, including Kennys Vargas, Danny Santana, Michael Tonkin, A.J. Achter, and Eric Fryer. Fryer, however, wasn't on the 40-man roster and a spot needed to be cleared.
Wheeler's departure from the 40-,man isn't a terribly big surprise. His performance in 54 Double-A innings has been passable enough, but the issue is that he started the season at Triple-A and couldn't hold his own. In 15 starts and 78 innings, opponents touched him for a .324 batting average and a 6.58 ERA. He couldn't get much by hitters, and when you're allowing base runners in droves it becomes much harder to prevent runs.
Minnesota's eighth-round pick in 2011, the left-handed Wheeler had posted sub-3.50 ERAs at each level of the minor leagues until his brick wall in Rochester this season. At 24 and in just his first real look at Triple-A, Wheeler will have an opportunity to make another run for somebody in 2015 - whether that's with the Twins or somewhere else.