The Twins have placed right-hander Bailey Ober on the 15-day injured list with a left hip impingement. Left-hander Kody Funderburk has been recalled to take his active roster spot for now, though Ober was scheduled to start Friday’s game, so the club will need to figure out their rotation plans in the coming days. The club also announced that infielder Jonah Bride, who was designated for assignment last week, has cleared waivers and been outrighted to Triple-A Saint Paul. Phil Miller of the Star Tribune reported the moves prior to the official announcement.
The towering 6’9″ Ober has been a constant in the Twins’ rotation dating back to 2021. He’s been a steady mid-rotation presence along the way, logging 471 1/3 innings with a 3.76 ERA (3.75 SIERA) from 2021-24. The 2025 season looked like more of the same. Ober was trounced for eight runs in his first start of the season but quickly righted the ship. By the end of May, he was sitting on a tidy 3.48 ERA despite that brutal first outing of the year.
The wheels came off completely last month, however. Ober started five games and yielded between four and seven runs in all of them. Opponents connected on an astonishing 14 home runs last month alone — more than half the amount he yielded all season in 2023 (22 homers) or in 2024 (27 homers). The long ball has always been somewhat of an issue for Ober, which isn’t a shock as a right-hander with sub-par fastball velocity, but last month’s sudden spike was alarming nonetheless.
Ober becomes the Twins’ third starter to hit the injured list in the past five weeks, joining ace Pablo López and top prospect Zebby Matthews. They’d already optioned Simeon Woods Richardson, who struggled after opening the season in the fifth spot, but he’s returned amid the recent injuries.
With Ober sidelined for a yet-to-be-determined period, the Twins will go with Joe Ryan, Chris Paddack, recent top prospect David Festa and Woods Richardson in the rotation. Prospects Travis Adams or Andrew Morris could get a look in the rotation moving forward, and Minnesota also claimed righty Connor Gillispie off waivers from the Marlins last week, providing a bit of additional depth.
It’s also possible the Twins will look outside the organization for more depth, as they already did late last month when signing José Ureña to a minor league deal. President of baseball operations Derek Falvey already acknowledged that he’d had some trade talks about adding more pitching in the wake of the Lopez and Matthews injuries, and further health woes could spur more urgency as the reeling Twins look to stay relevant in the AL playoff picture.
Bride, 29, came to the Twins in exchange for cash earlier this season after the Marlins had designated him for assignment. He posted a strong .276/.357/.461 slash and popped 11 homers in 71 games for Miami as recently as 2024, but he went 4-for-40 with a 33.3% strikeout rate in Miami to begin the season and batted only .208/.275/.236 in 80 plate appearances with Minnesota. Bride is a career .221/.311/.313 hitter in parts of four major league seasons but hasn’t had any success at the plate outside last year’s showing. Because Bride has fewer than three years of MLB service and has never been outrighted in the past, he can’t reject in favor of free agency. He’ll head to St. Paul and stick with the organization as a depth piece.
About time. He’s mentioned that he’s been pitching with hip issues. I’m sure continuing to pitch has made it worse. Is that on Ober or the Twins medical staff? Who knows, but either way, it’s not okay.
It’ll be interesting to see who the Twins get for the rotation. They don’t have a lot of options so I’m sure they’ll turn to Randy Dobnak so he can earn his $3m this year or they’ll trade for some guy with a 9.53 ERA on the waiver wires in exchange for cash.
It’s fine. Ober has been communicating with the team, the hip was a known issue and has been a known issue for a while.
Ober’s velo is down to 89mph and everything in his peripherals suggested he was getting extremely lucky so a lot of getting shelled is just regression.
It sounds more to me like Ober and the Twins are hoping getting his hip some rest will improve it and eliminate the hip as a potential source for the issue.
Andrew Morris is on the Triple A injured list, so he’s not an option right now
Long overdue move to IL for Ober.
What Brain Wizard of the Twinkies FINALLY realized this??
WRONG José Ureña. He’s not 18 years old. This website is very inaccurate!!
We have nobody to replace him best bet is Dobnak but that won’t end well likely.
Lopez is out for at least another month, and while Matthews is ahead of Lopez (already tossing), I’d be surprised to see Matthews back before the trade deadline as well.
As noted above, the Twins also have Morris on the IL Dobnak is no longer being utilized as a true starter, and he’s been very ineffective.
Given Ober’s exit to the IL, now it wouldn’t surprise me to see the Twins sign Kyle Gibson.