The Twins have acquired right-hander Noah Davis from the Dodgers, per Phil Miller of the Star Tribune. The Dodgers, who designated Davis for assignment last week, will receive cash considerations in return. The Twins had an open 40-man roster spot and are sending Davis to Triple-A St. Paul, so no corresponding move is required.
Davis, 28, signed a minor league deal with the Red Sox in the offseason. Perhaps that deal contained some sort of upward mobility clause, as the Red Sox flipped him to the Dodgers on Opening Day. The Dodgers put him on their 40-man roster but immediately optioned him to Triple-A Oklahoma City.
He has served as an optionable depth arm for the Dodgers this year, with five big league appearances scattered throughout the season. The first four were pretty normal but the fifth was gruesome. On the Fourth of July, the Dodgers were losing to the Astros 7-1 in the fifth inning. They brought Davis in with two outs in the fifth and he struck out Mauricio Dubón to finish the frame. Davis was sent back out for the top of the sixth and allowed ten earned runs on six hits, three walks and a hit-by-pitch.
That nightmare outing gave Davis an earned run average of 19.50 for the year. He was optioned after the game and designated for assignment a few days later. He also has an unsightly 8.95 ERA in his career, though all of his major league work had been with the Rockies prior to this year.
Presumably, the Twins are looking at the larger sample of work Davis has put together in the minors. This year, he has tossed 32 Triple-A innings with a 3.94 ERA. His 10.9% walk rate is a bit high but his 27.5% strikeout rate is strong and his 48.1% ground ball rate quite good as well. His minor league numbers prior to this year aren’t as strong but he has mostly been a starter until recently. Perhaps the move to the bullpen has allowed him to find a new gear.
The Twins had an open roster spot and Davis is still optionable for the rest of the year, so he’s a sensible depth add. He can give the club an extra arm for now. It seems the Twins are getting lots of interest in relievers like Jhoan Durán and Griffin Jax. It’s unclear if they have any plans to entertain trades of those guys, but the path for Davis would open up if something like that comes to pass.
Photo courtesy of Jayne Kamin-Oncea, Imagn Images
The rich get richer!
They needed more money to give Darren Dreifort a raise.
Well it’s consistent with the current political landscape.
What a world we live in, the Dodgers actually got payed by the Twins to take away their crap.
When he pitches fans are encouraged to bring two animals of each species to the (p)ark.
For two dollars and a case of Gatorade.
That’s a lot, a 20-dollar lottery scratch off ticket sounds about right.
Hey dude the twins need to keep all the assets with upside they got. That lottery ticket ain’t going anywhere dagnabbit!
You drive a hard bargain. All joking aside, it’s remarkable how some players seem to get opportunity after opportunity, when nothing about their performance seems to justify it.
In todays game, having options left, and being able to be shuttled between mlb and AAA 8 or 10 times a year seems to supersede actual talent or effectiveness.
Yep, I get the warm body factor, but every player in the minors comes up with their three option years intact. Some if not most don’t seem to justify using any of them.
Perhaps you’re being hyperbolic but the limit is 5 options per season
I referred to option years, not options per season. Most players get three option years.
mlb.com/glossary/transactions/minor-league-options
What flavor Gatorade? It matters.
Margarita. My personal favorite.
Dodger fans rejoice
I wish they would take Banda.
We’ll be back for Jhoan in 2 weeks
The Twins should probably trade “everyone” that doesn’t have at least 3+ years of control left, (and some who do) not sure why that much talent cannot perform more consistently and of course I’m not around or even watch them enough to really be able to say “why” but it seems half their team is just flat out not athletic enough, a few of those guys can be hidden in/on a defense or lineup but watching the Brewers do what they do, well just like the Brewers struggled with long losing streaks throughout the Fielder/Braun eras (and even for a while after) well now the twins find themselves with similar roster construction, too many streaky bat first guys and outside of Castro little to no roster flexibility, the Twins have major assets that if dealt responsibly could really net them some budding talents, they need pitching/speed, but unfortunately so do most, but with what I’ve read the owner is trying to sell so he’s probably trying to finagle the situation so he can say “look at all this talent and continuity/consistency and familiarity this team has” blah blah ect. ect. So hopefully I’m wrong but until there’s a “sale” or who knows what, there probably won’t be many operational/philosophical or meaningful changes made that are probably necessary for this team to be able to compete consistently/legitimately despite the fact they may have more talent than the rest of their division combined, (I know that’s not “actually” true, but jeez the Twins seem to do so lil with so much talent) hopefully there’ll be a sale soon to some billionaire (or group of them in “my” Milwaukee Bucks case) that’ll finally run that org/make some changes necessary to be able to consistently play ball “day in/day out”
And most people said the twins wouldn’t make any moves at the deadline!!!!!