For two to three “solid days” after he collided with center fielder Byron Buxton in Baltimore, Carlos Correa experienced dizziness, headaches and brain fog.

“My thoughts were slow,” the shortstop said. “It was definitely very different from where I usually am.”

The two smacked into each other last Thursday trying to catch a Cedric Mullins fly ball, leaving both with concussions. On Friday, Correa returned to the Twins’ lineup, cleared to return to the field after undergoing neurological testing. Buxton still remains out, though he is ramping up baseball activities and completed ground-based running on Friday at Target Field.

The play, Correa said, was a “weird,” one, noting that after the first two innings of the game, the sun had just come out in Baltimore.

“The ball was right in the sun for me so I was like angling on the side and then when I went to make my move to get into the sun and catch it, that’s when he called me off.”

When he heard Buxton calling for the ball, he tried to get out of the way. But after the ball landed in Buxton’s glove, they both moved in the same direction. The result was the two Twins stars down on the grass, both being tended to for minutes before they were able to get up. Correa left the game immediately. Buxton stayed in for that half inning before departing.

“It’s unfortunate,” Correa said. “You don’t want it to happen but at the same time, a play like that happens very rarely where we both are going after that ball. It was just one of those where it was a perfect storm and everything lined up for us to collide.”

Correa said he physically feels like he is full-go and expressed happiness that the way the schedule worked out meant he missed five games, rather than seven.

Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said they would treat him as day to day initially, letting him play and then assessing how he’s doing just to make sure everything is going smoothly. He might wind up with a day off within the next few days.

“You just never know when you’re in these types of situations, when you deal with any sort of head injury and recovery and such, you really do have to play it slow and play it day-by-day,” Baldelli said. “We got to a really good point and he feels great, so it was clear the time was now that we could activate him. Knowing that we put that past and we can focus now on just playing, that’s a good feeling.”

Wallner on rehab

Baldelli isn’t scouring the minor league box scores to check in on his players when they go on rehab assignments — “as long as they’re healthy and doing fine, that’s really the only thing I care about,” — but he was aware that right fielder Matt Wallner had hit two home runs on Thursday night in the first game of his rehab assignment.

Wallner, who has been out since mid-April with a hamstring strain, was scheduled to begin his rehab assignment on Wednesday but the Saints were rained out. He started in right field on Thursday and was the Saints’ designated hitter on Saturday.

Briefly

Zebby Matthews is scheduled to start on Saturday in the second game of the Twins’ series against the Royals. Matthews gave up four runs in three innings his last start out, his first at the major league level this season. He will be opposed by right-hander Michael Wacha. … The first 10,000 fans through the gates on Saturday will receive a Royce Lewis City Connect bobblehead. … Most Twins players were sporting Timberwolves gear pregame after receiving shirts and hoodies from their next-door neighbors.

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Timberwolves coach Chris Finch can’t afford to waste a moment in these Western Conference Finals, particularly not with his team down 2-0 and needing to win four of the next five games to upset the Thunder.

“Every minute in this series,” Finch said after Minnesota’s Game 2 loss to Oklahoma City, “is a chance to find something.”

Perhaps Minnesota found that “something” in the fourth quarter Thursday, when it outscored the Thunder by seven.

Down 22 to start the frame, the Wolves had Oklahoma City’s advantage whittled down to 10 with three minutes to play.

Jaden McDaniels noted Minnesota had success getting the ball out of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s hands with the use of multiple defenders and then, when that resulted in stops, pushing immediately the other way on offense.

“Be aggressive,” McDaniels said. “I feel like if we start the game that way, we will give ourselves a chance to win the game.”

If that formula sounds familiar, it’s because it’s exactly what Minnesota did to erase a 24-point fourth quarter deficit to beat the Thunder in overtime back in February. On the floor during that chaotic comeback? McDaniels, Naz Reid, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Terrence Shannon Jr. and Rob Dillingham.

So … not Minnesota’s traditional starting five, or anything close to it. It was a small-ball lineup willing and able to both play a scrambling defensive scheme and run out in transition at every given opportunity.

That worked, and Minnesota’s base defense – an elite weapon for much of the year – has been rendered ineffective through two games of this series. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams are getting wherever they want with relative ease against Minnesota’s drop pick and roll coverage. Those two hit one midrange shot after another in Game 2.

Finch said Minnesota has to do a better job of “squaring up” their drives to prevent them from getting to that 10-to-12 foot range. But that’s not feasible in a pick and roll coverage in which Gobert is drifting back toward the paint.

“Shai is one of the best in the world to get to his spot and rise up. Our bigs have got to be up. Our guards have to be ready to switch stuff to where you take away the middie,” Wolves guard Mike Conley said. “It’s no longer one of those we’ll settle for a mid-range shot type series. You can’t give that up to these guys. These guys make that shot.”

McDaniels also suggested Minnesota mix up its coverages against the pick and roll action, perhaps going under the screen on some actions to force 3-point attempts or playing a high-wall look in which the defender guarding the screener is up at the level of the screen, taking away the driving lane and forcing Williams and Gilgeous-Alexander to play more east and west.

These all sound like potential solutions. The question is whether Minnesota can execute them with their traditional personnel, Julius Randle – who’s been Minnesota’s most consistent player this postseason – didn’t play in the fourth quarter Thursday. Gobert played less than half the final frame.

Conley and Nickeil Alexander-Walker were both asked how Minnesota can play the way it needs to against this Oklahoma City team with its bigger lineups. Both had lengthy pauses before mustering up answers.

Conley mentioned “mindset” and “urgency.” Alexander-Walker said “all five guys have to be on a string.” Again, those sound easier to achieve with smaller lineups.

That may just be the answer in this specific matchup. Minnesota’s roster has been praised for its depth and versatility. Finch has been tentative to dig beyond his top eight veterans for answers in key spots throughout the season. But maybe Shannon Jr. and Jaylen Clark need legitimate playing time if the Wolves are to beat the Thunder at their own game.

Because Minnesota’s game isn’t working. Change is likely needed. If Minnesota is in trouble at any point in Game 3 – a must-win contest for the Wolves’ series hopes – Finch may have to get comfortable making some uncomfortable decisions. Or perhaps he’ll be even more proactive than that.

This is the first series in which the Wolves may not have the most talented roster. Style may need to determine rotations.

“I think the main theme just leans back to matching that intensity. They’re a very aggressive team on both ends of the floor. They play very hard, and so we can’t rely on just our talent to get us to where we need to in this series,” Alexander-Walker said. “We got to put pace into the game and in the fourth quarter, I think that’s when we felt more life. You can kind of even hear it in the building. There’s parts in that second quarter as well when we made that run. Putting pace into the game for us and being aggressive with the time that we have, it helps us.”

At the very least, at this point, it can’t hurt.

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In his third phone call with Vladimir Putin, President Donald Trump once again bowed to the Russian leader over ending Moscow’s war on Ukraine. The great dealmaker let the Kremlin boss set all the terms.

Trump’s mishandling of Putin was well summed up in an interview I did (before Monday’s Trump-Putin phone call) with the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Bridget Brink, one of the best-informed and most dedicated foreign service professionals I have met over decades of foreign reporting.

Brink, who had worked for five presidents and served in Kyiv for three years, recently quit and retired because she felt she could no longer implement White House policy on Ukraine.

“I resigned,” she said, “because the Trump administration’s policy put pressure on the victim, Ukraine, and let the aggressor, Russia, off the hook. This is not the way to end the war in a just and lasting way.”

“Peace at any cost is not peace,” she told me. “It is appeasement, and it just leads to more war.”

One of several moments that convinced Brink she could no longer serve came when Trump and Vice President JD Vance berated Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in the Oval Office back in February.

Another turning point: After a deliberate Russian missile strike slaughtered nine children in a playground in Zelenskyy’s hometown, Trump officialdom decided the formal condolence note sent by the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv should not blame Russia for the attack.

“They are even afraid to say the word ‘Russian’ when talking about the missile that killed the children,” the Ukrainian president wrote bitterly at the time.

Said Brink: “We continued to put all the blame on Ukraine and not hold Russia to account.”

Until this moment, the former ambassador points out: “There is no indication from Putin that he wants to end this war. I believe he is looking for every way to draw this out, because he believes time is on his side, while he kills men, women, and children every day.”

Brink said the U.S. has powerful leverage on Russia if used in coordination with European allies. That includes further sanctions on Russian energy exports and banks, and cooperation in using Russia’s frozen assets in Europe, which could then pay for more U.S. weapons for Ukraine.

“Russia is not as strong as some people think,” she said firmly, with reference to its weakening economy. Ukraine, which has become a global leader in advanced weapons technology, now has the strongest army in Europe. “I’m sure they won’t stop fighting, because they are battling for their future, their independence, and their land.”

If the United States continues to provide some security assets that Europeans lack, such as intelligence cooperation and help with air defenses, and as NATO members up their military spending (prodded by Trump), a united Western front might well force Putin to bargain seriously.

Yet, as Brink points out, “So far our administration has not taken steps to put additional pressure on Russia in order to achieve peace.”

Instead, the opposite is true. Who can forget Trump’s Truth Social post, after a brutal Russian strike on Kyiv on April 25, pleading with Putin, “Vladimir, STOP!” These two words have become an international meme, poking fun at Trump, especially since Putin ignored him.

The U.S. president has made concession after concession to Putin without requiring any reciprocity, sending a glaring message of weakness.

And Trump’s insistence that only he could resolve the Ukraine war in conversation with Putin was just proved embarrassingly hollow. Putin refused to accept the president’s demand for an immediate, unconditional 30-day ceasefire or face new sanctions, humiliating Trump again before the entire world. After Vladimir said nyet, Trump buckled and made excuses for the Russians. He told journalists there would be no new sanctions, because that might make things “much worse.” No wonder many believe (I don’t) that Putin has kompromat on Trump.

To cover up his kowtow, the president crowed that Russia and Ukraine would now begin negotiations for a ceasefire. This is just what Putin wants — endless rounds of low-level talks, based on the Kremlin’s unyielding demands for complete Ukrainian capitulation. Talks that buy time to undermine the United States, further split the Western alliance, and exhaust Ukraine.

And the key to Putin’s plan is to keep massaging Trump, who is now talking of “largescale TRADE” with Russia, and appears eager to drop, not intensify, sanctions on the Kremlin. Such large-scale trade is a fantasy.

There actually is a much more promising prospect of major trade: with Kyiv (beyond the overhyped minerals deal). Yet, that can only emerge if the fighting ends with a real peace, meaning an independent Ukraine secured from further Russian attack.

“For real peace to happen, it requires naming the aggressor, putting pressure on the aggressor,” Brink said.

“You don’t give up anything in advance,” she noted, until Putin agrees to an unconditional ceasefire. And any agreement will require strong European security guarantees, backed by Washington, and a strong verification mechanism because “the Russians don’t keep agreements.”

“Putin won’t stop at Ukraine,” Brink stated, as history shows. “He wants Europe divided. Russia is aligned with China and North Korea. Russia’s war is an attempt to weaken us. We can’t fall for the bait.”

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My fear is that Trump will insist on rolling over for Putin. He hinted Monday that he may withdraw from any mediation role — which could mean halting the still crucial, if dwindling, U.S. military aid authorized under President Joe Biden, and lifting Russian sanctions in pursuit of gas deals and a Trump Tower in Moscow.

Seventy-five senators, Democrats and Republicans, have signed the Sanctioning Russia Act of 2025, which calls for imposing sanctions on Russia “if the Government of the Russian Federation refuses to negotiate a peace agreement with Ukraine.”

Would that the GOP signatories had the guts to act.

Trudy Rubin is a columnist and editorial-board member  for The Philadelphia Inquirer, P.O. Box 8263, Philadelphia, Pa. 19101. Her email address is trubin@phillynews.com

Stephen Adly Guirgis is a New York City playwright who brings the world stories from the streets, where the conversations can sound astonishingly life-like and not for the squeamish. And his gift for creating complex and thoroughly human characters can be an actor’s dream.

If you want to experience an exquisite intersection of marvelous writing and excellent acting, I recommend Park Square Theatre’s season-closing production of “Between Riverside and Crazy,” a play for which Guirgis won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

For his first time in the director’s chair since being named the company’s artistic director, Stephen DiMenna has helped sculpt a show that sets a high bar with the quality of its stagecraft and promises great things to come for a theater that looked to be on life support as we emerged from the pandemic.

If DiMenna wants Park Square’s niche in our rich and vibrant Twin Cities theater scene to be the place where new plays meet outstanding acting, his production of “Between Riverside and Crazy” is a bold and brilliant assertion of the company’s new identity. Sparked by seven meticulously well-crafted performances, it’s an increasingly gripping tale of one man’s recovery from a tragedy and his winding path toward redemption.

That man is Walter Washington, a New York City cop forced into retirement after a shooting and now recently widowed. Since 1978, he’s lived in a rent-controlled apartment, but he’s facing threats of eviction as he’s opened his home to a son who might be fencing stolen goods and young friends of his who are struggling to stay sober.

When visitors arrive, playwright Guirgis really writes up a storm. Walter’s former beat partner and her fiance come for dinner and a discussion of the protagonist’s next move that turns into a clinic for how to convey hyper-realism and keep it compelling. When a church volunteer comes to check in on Walter, things take a wildly unexpected turn. And when father and son have a long overdue heart-to-heart, it feels disarmingly (and perhaps discomfitingly) real.

As Walter, Emil Herrera deftly captures the practiced calmness and simmering rage of a man wrestling with what justice might look like for him. Most of the time, Walter serves as the stillness at the center of a swirl of more animated characters, but when he asserts control over the conversation, Herrera makes him compelling.

Also thoroughly believable and fascinating to watch are Laura Esping as Walter’s former partner Audrey and Terry Hempleman as her fiance, who’s climbing up the department hierarchy. They make for convincing cops (language alert), and become catalysts for Walter’s quandary: As a Black man who’s experienced racism in the force, he’s conflicted as to whether he’s part of this fraternity or not.

Another combination of great writing and fine acting comes when Kiko Laureano becomes a messenger of magic, as if this visitor has just stepped out of a Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel and into Walter’s apartment. And then there’s Darius Dotch as the son who’s inherited much of his father’s reserve but is similarly seeking some sort of satisfying resolution to this troubled stretch of his life. He’s part of a cast with impeccable chemistry, their skills fusing to help create an excellent production.

‘Between Riverside and Crazy’

When: Through June 8

Where: Park Square Theatre, 20 W. Seventh Place, St. Paul

Tickets: $60-$25, available at 651-291-7005 or parksquaretheatre.org

Capsule: A gritty, compelling confluence of brilliant writing and outstanding acting.

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