The Twins announced that right-hander Ronny Henriquez has been designated for assignment. That opens a roster spot for the signings of outfielder Harrison Bader and left-hander Danny Coulombe, which are now official. The club opened another roster spot yesterday by trading utility player Michael Helman to the Cardinals.
Henriquez, 25 in June, has spent most of the past three years on the club’s roster. He came up as a Rangers prospect, getting added to that club’s 40-man roster in November of 2021, keeping him out of that year’s Rule 5 draft. Texas traded him to the Twins a few months later alongside infielder Isiah Kiner-Falefa in the March 2022 deal to acquire catcher Mitch Garver. Henriquez spent 2022 and 2023 as a depth arm but was non-tendered after the latter of those two seasons. He re-signed on a minor league deal going into 2024 and was back on the 40-man in late April.
Over those three years, he didn’t get much major league action. He has 31 innings pitched at this point with a 2.90 earned run average in that small sample. His 18.2% strikeout rate is subpar but his 6.1% walk rate and 53.1% ground ball rate are both strong.
His numbers in the minors have been somewhat similar. A starter earlier in his career, the Twins have mostly kept him in a multi-inning relief role for the past two seasons. In 2024, he logged 55 innings over 34 Triple-A appearances with a 3.44 ERA, 24.9% strikeout rate, 7.2% walk rate and 53.8% ground ball rate.
Despite the decent results, Henriquez was likely running out of time on the roster. He exhausted his final option year in 2024, meaning the Twins would no longer be able to move him to Triple-A and back with such fluidity. As such, he got bumped off the roster today. Minnesota will now have a week of DFA limbo to figure out what’s next, whether that’s a trade or some fate on waivers. The waiver process takes 48 hours, so any trade talks would have to take place in the next five days.
Though the Twins couldn’t find room for him, it’s possible another club is willing to grab him. As recently as June, Eric Longenhagen and Travis Ice of FanGraphs ranked Henriquez as the #27 prospect in the Twins’ system, suggesting he had a future as a decent middle reliever. If some club is willing to give him a roster spot now, he has less than a year of service time, meaning he comes with a possible six seasons of club control.
Hope he can pass through waivers. I was high on him as a reliever for a bit but twins have so many BP options and advanced metrics didn’t like his work last year. Fastball gets hit hard
xSLG on fastball was .721
His fastball shape has been so fickle. Most of the time it was just above average, a bad pair with shaky control and mediocre secondaries, but occasionally he was ripping 2600+ from a low release point with elite IVB and almost no IHB. Bet a team with roster space to waste takes a chance to see if he can find that elite fastball consistently.
Falvey you stink please go away.
Twins have to think he’ll pass through unclaimed. Would be a massive bummer if he’s claimed while Michael Tonkin remains on the roster
Poor roster management by the PBO & new GM.
Well if the braves don’t sign a reliever in the next few days, might be worth a shot on taking a flier on this guy! Minor league numbers are pretty good, and limited major league numbers aren’t that bad either. You could see his advanced metrics improve with more time plus being only 25 seems like a good target.
It’s a shame how much strikeout rates and spin rates factor into the valuation of pitchers these days. If a pitcher can get batters out, who cares how he does it? If you don’t have a strikeout rate over 20% or a very high spin rate, your chances of sticking with a team are very low. This guy has shown he can get batters out and has an excellent GB% rate as well, but he ends up getting DFA’d due to his lackluster strikeout rate. Hopefully, another team takes a chance on him and he gets to pitch for a full season. If he can keep his ERA under 3.25 and his WHIP under 1.3, that’s a darn good pitcher regardless of his peripherals.
Seems like a guy that’ll get picked up. Hopefully he lands at an organization that values him.