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Twins Acquire Jonah Bride

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April 17: The Twins officially placed Wallner on the IL today, with Bride taking his spot on the active roster.

April 16: The Twins announced that they have acquired infielder Jonah Bride from the Marlins. Miami, who designated Bride for assignment yesterday, will receive cash considerations in return. Dan Hayes of The Athletic was among those to report the move prior to the official announcement. The Twins have had an open 40-man spot since righty Scott Blewett was designated for assignment a few days ago. It was reported earlier today that outfielder Matt Wallner is heading to the 10-day injured list with a hamstring strain, which will open an active roster spot. Bobby Nightengale of the Minnesota Star Tribune was among those to relay the Wallner news.

Bride, 29, has a pretty good track record of minor league performance. Dating back to the start of the 2021 season, he has stepped to the plate 1,166 times on the farm with a 17.1% walk rate, higher than his 16% strikeout rate. That helped him produce a combined .289/.421/.489 batting line and 137 wRC+ in that time.

That got him some brief major league opportunities with the Athletics in 2022 and 2023, but he didn’t hit will in those, slashing .192/.296/.232. He was acquired by the Marlins going into 2024 and seemed to show some promise. He got into 71 games for the Fish last year, hitting 11 home runs and walking at an 11% pace. That led to a .276/.357/.461 line and 123 wRC+.

But he got out to a rough start here in 2025, with a .100/.200/.100 line and 33.3% strikeout rate through 45 plate appearances. Now out of options, he got bumped off Miami’s 40-man roster this week when Jesús Sánchez returned from the injured list.

Though the Twins are going to put Wallner on the injured list, they need more help on the infield, particularly on the left side. In terms of outfielders, without Wallner, they have Byron Buxton, Harrison Bader, Trevor Larnach and DaShawn Keirsey Jr. on the active roster and prospect Emmanuel Rodriguez on optional assignment.

The infield mix is pretty banged up, however. Shortstop Carlos Correa was removed from yesterday’s game with some left wrist soreness. He told Nightengale that he’s been dealing with it since late last year. He’s out to a rough start this season, hitting .164/.227/.246 thus far.

Correa didn’t start this afternoon’s contest, with Willi Castro plugging in at short. However, Castro was removed with some tightness in his right oblique, per Hayes. Correa was subbed in defensively in the ninth but the Twins were not planning to let him hit if that spot in the order came around, per Matthew Leach of MLB.com. The Twins walked off the Mets in the tenth, so manager Rocco Baldelli didn’t have to figure out a plan for what to do once Correa’s spot in the order came up.

The Twins are already without Royce Lewis, who is on the IL with a strained hamstring. They optioned the struggling José Miranda to the minors recently and he got hurt almost immediately after in a strange accident. Per Nightengale, Miranda was shopping at Target and dropped a case of water. He caught it and suffered a left hand strain in the process, getting placed on the minor league seven-day IL. Austin Martin is also on the minor league IL, per his transactions tracker at MLB.com, getting put on the shelf with a right hamstring strain on April 11.

The Twins have Ty France and Edouard Julien at first and second but shortstop and third are more up in the air with Lewis, Correa, Castro, Martin and Miranda all banged up or out of commission. Bride has played all of the non-shortstop infield positions, so he will give them another guy capable of playing third. Perhaps Brooks Lee will then cover shortstop while Correa and Castro get some time off to heal up.

The Twins are off tomorrow, so they have a bit of time to assess how things go before the weekend, but Bride was available and fits nicely with their current predicament. As mentioned, he is out of options, but he has less than two years of service time. That means he can be affordably retained well into the future if he manages to hold onto a roster spot.

Photo courtesy of John Jones, Imagn Images

Twins Option Jose Miranda, Activate Brooks Lee

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TODAY: The Twins officially announced Lee’s reinstatement from the IL, and Miranda being optioned to Triple-A.

APRIL 12: The Twins are set to option infielder Jose Miranda to the minor leagues, according to a report from Aaron Gleeman of The Athletic. Gleeman goes on to suggest that Miranda’s departure will make way for the return of infielder Brooks Lee, who he reports is expected to be activated from the 10-day injured list after missing the start of the season due to a bout of lower back tightness.

The demotion for Miranda comes after a baserunning blunder in today’s loss to the Tigers. The Tigers’ defense set up a force out at second base for Miranda, but second baseman Colt Keith failed to touch the bag, leaving the umpire to initially call Miranda safe. However, Miranda began walking back to the dugout before ever touching second base himself under the assumption he had been called out, allowing Keith to tag him for the out and costing Minnesota an opportunity to bat with a runner in scoring position. As noted by Gleeman, manager Rocco Baldelli was candid in his comments on the mistake after the game.

“Jose has to do better on that play,” Baldelli said. “The guy on the other side of the field was not on the bag and Jose didn’t make it to the bag on the slide either way. And the umpire was clearly signaling safe. We have to be paying attention, to say the least. We have to be paying attention there and never allow something like that to happen.”

While the timing of the move can’t be ignored, it’s fair to point out that the decision may have come strictly for performance reasons even ignoring today’s blunder. After all, Miranda has struggled badly this year with a lackluster .143/.143/.229 slash line in 11 games entering play today. That slash line comes with a massive 37.1% strikeout rate and zero walks taken, suggesting the infielder’s swing decisions may not be where they need to be in order for him to succeed in the majors at the moment. Miranda has never walked especially often, but he struck out just 15.4% of the time last season.

While Miranda had only gotten 35 plate appearances this year entering play today, his struggles date back to the 2024 season as well. His overall slash line was good for a 115 wRC+, but Miranda struggled quite badly in August and September with a .217/.243/.312 slash line over his final 144 plate appearances last year. That lengthy period of issues at the plate stretching back to midway through last season suggests the infielder might need a reset in the minors, where he can focus on getting right without the pressure of trying to help lift an 4-11 ballclub out of its early-season hole.

Regardless of the reasoning behind Miranda’s departure, his spot on the active roster will go to Lee. The Twins’ first-round pick in the 2022 draft, Lee made his big league debut last year. His 50 games in the majors weren’t exactly what Minnesota was hoping for, as he hit just .221/.265/.320. He struck out just 14.6% of the time, but walked at a clip of just 5.9% and showed little power, though he did play solid defense all around the infield. In his return to the roster, Lee will likely be tasked handling either second or third base on a regular basis. Edouard Julien is currently handling the keystone while Willi Castro covers the hot corner, though Julien could work his way into the first base and DH mix if bumped off of second base while Castro has the versatility to play anywhere but catcher.

Royce Lewis To Begin Season On Injured List

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March 17: Lewis has been diagnosed with a “moderate” hamstring strain and will begin the season on the injured list, writes Phil Miller of the Minneapolis Star Tribune. The injury is “not even close” to as serious as the quad strain that sidelined Lewis for more than two months early last season, according to Lewis himself. The team still does not have a formal timetable for his return to the active roster, however.

March 16: The Twins suffered a potentially devastating blow today when third baseman Royce Lewis exited the game after pulling up while running out a grounder. As relayed by Betsy Helfand of the St. Paul Pioneer Press, the Twins subsequently announced that the infielder had been diagnosed with a hamstring strain. The severity of the injury is currently unclear, but it seems likely that Lewis will miss at least some time with Opening Day less than two weeks away.

Lewis, 25, is among a number of immensely talented but often injured players on the Twins’ roster. The first overall pick in the 2017 draft, Lewis was a consensus top-10 prospect in the sport all the way back in 2019 and appeared to be on the verge of a big league debut in 2021. Unfortunately, a right ACL tear wiped out the entire 2021 season for the youngster, and while he made his big league debut in 2022 he suffered a second right ACL tear shortly thereafter that sidelined him until late May of 2023.

He’s been a more regular fixture of the club’s big league roster since that second call-up, though he’s missed time over the past two years due to oblique, hamstring, quad, and adductor strains. All of those injury woes have left Lewis with just 140 games played and 564 plate appearances under his belt over the past two seasons, though he’s remained an exciting talent through all of those issues and slashed .265/.328/.493 with a 127 wRC+ and 3.5 fWAR while playing third base for the Twins when healthy enough to take the field.

After his first fully healthy offseason of his major league career, it seemed as though Lewis was set to finally have a shot at participating in a wire-to-wire MLB season. Those hopes have likely been scuttled for the time being now, though, as his latest hamstring injury appears likely to keep him off the club’s Opening Day roster given Lewis’s lengthy injury and, more specifically, his history of lower half issues. It should be expected that the Twins will proceed with caution when it comes to handling the youngster given that context, although it seems likely that a more specific timetable for Lewis’s return won’t be clear until more information about the severity of Lewis’s strain is available.

If there’s a silver lining in this for the Twins, it’s that the club is reasonably well-equipped to handle the loss of Lewis. Jose Miranda is likely the favorite to step in at third base in Lewis’s place and hit a respectable .284/.322/.441 in 121 games last year as he rebounded from a dreadful 2023 campaign. If Miranda were to stumble, however, they’d have further flexibility as well. Brooks Lee is currently penciled in as the club’s second baseman but could slide over to the hot corner to make room for Edouard Julien or top infield prospect Luke Keaschall at the keystone.

Aside from those possibilities, the club also has a versatile option with no set position at its disposal in Willi Castro. Castro is already slated to serve in a super utility role and could cover any spot on the diamond as needed. If Castro were to play on the infield dirt regularly, that could open up time in the outfield or at DH for potential outfield options like DaShawn Keirsey, Austin Martin, or even top prospect Emmanuel Rodriguez.

Ty France To Serve As Twins’ Starting First Baseman

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The Twins made their recent signing of Ty France to a big league deal official earlier today, and manager Rocco Baldelli made it clear to reporters (including Bobby Nightengale of the Star Tribune) today that their new addition is taking over as the club’s regular first baseman.

“He’s going to play a lot,” Baldelli said, as relayed by Nightengale. “That’s really the best way of saying it. The kind of hitter that he is, this isn’t a platoon situation. I think he’s going to play.”

The Twins spent the majority of the offseason hoping to find a steady presence at first base after Carlos Santana departed for the division-rival Guardians in free agency, and now it appears they’ll turn to France to be just that. Even as France is coming off a down season in 2024, it’s not hard to understand why they decided to make that bet. After a lackluster rookie season with the Padres back in 2019, France broke out in 2020 and was traded to the Mariners midseason. He went on to have a strong three-year run in Seattle where he slashed .285/.355/.443 (129 wRC+). He made occasional cameos at both second and third base but mostly settled in as the club’s regular first baseman, even earning an All-Star nod at the position in 2022.

Unfortunately, France began to struggle after that. Though he played in 158 games for the Mariners in 2023, his production was only pedestrian as he hit just .250/.337/.366 with a 105 wRC+. Five percent better than league average isn’t bad, but also falls below expectations for an everyday player at a bat-first position for a contending club. It seemed as though France’s disappointing 2023 may just have been a flash in the pan early last year, as he entered 2024 hitting a robust .251/.329/.403 (117 wRC+) in his first 61 games of the season. Unfortunately, France suffered a fractured heel in mid-June of last year that sidelined him for two weeks, and he looked like a different player upon his return as he hit just .225/.285/.336 (73 wRC+) the rest of the way last season.

It would hardly be a surprise to hear that France, who entered the season with a career .309 BABIP but managed just a .255 BABIP following his injury, was hampered by the lingering effects of that injury throughout the latter part of the season. France himself acknowledged the role his injured heel may have played in his struggles last year, but didn’t want to entirely blame his injury.

“When you don’t have a foot, it’s hard to do things,” France said, as relayed by Nightengale. “I don’t want to put all the blame on that. There was a lot that went into it. I tried a different style of training that offseason trying to revamp my swing. It didn’t work out the way I thought it would. This offseason, I spent a lot of time just getting back to the basics of things. When I simplify hitting and just get back to being myself, I’m a pretty good hitter.”

With France seemingly being given a shot to prove himself healthy and effective out the gate in 2025, that leaves the Twins’ plans for Edouard Julien and Jose Miranda in question. The pair are headed into their age-26 and -27 seasons, respectively, and each has had significant success in the majors in the past as well as notable struggles. The duo seemed likely to handle first base for the Twins in 2025 without an external addition, but now that France is in the fold as the nominal starter at the spot in the lineup it’s unclear if either Miranda or Julien will have a path to consistent playing time. Both have experience elsewhere on the infield (Miranda primarily at third base, Julien at second) but are questionable defenders at those spots and may be better suited for a first base/DH role.

Of course, even without a clear path to playing time on Opening Day it’s easy to imagine either or both players getting significant reps this year. Byron Buxton, Carlos Correa, and Royce Lewis have all struggled to stay healthy during their time with the Twins and trips to the injured list for either Correa or Buxton could open up playing time on the infield for Miranda or Julien to take advantage of. A trade of an established hitter like Willi Castro could change the playing time picture in Minnesota, as could under-performance by either France himself or someone like top prospect Brooks Lee.

Twins Notes: Varland, Woods Richardson, Castro

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The Twins entered the 2024 season with high hopes that prospect and Twin Cities native Louie Varland would step up and seize a spot in the rotation. The former 15th-round pick had the look of a late-round steal, having climbed to the No. 88 prospect in the game on FanGraphs’ top-100 rankings after pitching to a 3.06 ERA, 27.3% strikeout rate and 7.9% walk rate in 126 1/3 innings between Double-A and Triple-A in 2022 and notching a 3.81 ERA through 26 frames in his MLB debut late that season. Varland posted a 3.97 ERA with similar strikeout and walk rates in 81 2/3 Triple-A frames in 2023 and then held his own with a 4.63 ERA and continued K-BB rates in his 2023 range.

The 2024 season, however, could scarcely have gone worse for Varland. He lasted four starts in the rotation before being optioned to Triple-A with a 9.18 ERA (17 runs in 16 2/3 innings). Varland had a rollercoaster season in Triple-A, resulting in a 4.75 ERA through 16 starts, though a disproportionate amount of damage came in one start that saw him tagged for a staggering 11 earned runs. (He had a combined 3.67 ERA in his other appearances.) A late look in the majors yielded poor overall results, though Varland did finish with a nice stretch of 7 2/3 innings, wherein he allowed two runs with an 11-to-2 K/BB ratio.

Dan Hayes of The Athletic reports that as the Twins gear up for 2025, it appears increasingly likely that Varland will be ticketed for a relief role. The St. Paul native averaged better than 95 mph on his heater last season even when working as a starter; it’s reasonable to expect that velocity to play up in a transition to a shorter role. Varland has posted at least average swinging-strike rates in the upper minors and big leagues as well, so it stands to reason that he could see an uptick in whiffs with a more powerful repertoire.

One reason it’s become easier to move a former rotation hopeful like Varland to the ’pen has been the reemergence of Simeon Woods Richardson. The former top prospect had tumbled down Minnesota’s starting pitching depth chart heading into ’24 after a dismal 2023 showing in Triple-A. But, as Woods Richardson explained in a sitdown with The Athletic’s Aaron Gleeman, an offseason and spring training of work with the Twins’ data team and coaching staff brought about a new arm slot that produced more velocity and a new-look slider that broke out as his most effective secondary pitch.

Woods Richardson wore down a bit late in the 2024 season as he pushed to a new career-high level in terms of workload (31 starts, 147 innings), but he finished the season with a 4.17 ERA, 20.6% strikeout rate and 8.4% walk rate. His four-seamer, which averaged just 90.7 mph in his brief MLB looks in 2022-23, sat at 93.1 mph on the season despite fading over his final six starts (92.1 mph average four-seamer, 6.75 ERA). Woods Richardson, acquired alongside Austin Martin in the trade that sent the final year-plus of control over Jose Berrios to Toronto, now looks like he’ll open the 2025 season locked into the No. 4 spot in Minnesota’s rotation behind Pablo Lopez, Joe Ryan and Bailey Ober.

Development from in-house arms of this nature will be key for the Twins in 2025, as ownership has handcuffed the baseball operations staff all offseason in terms of roster additions, as the Pohlad family explores a sale of the club. The Twins have been active in trade talks but have not yet pieced together a deal of much note. They’ve added some catching depth in small swaps for former top prospect Diego Cartaya and utilityman Mickey Gasper, but top trade candidates like Christian Vazquez and Chris Paddack remain with the club. The Twins still would like to add at first base and pick up a right-handed hitting outfielder, but there’s been no trade of note and not one major league free agent signing thus far, given payroll constraints from ownership. The Twins may not need to cut payroll from its current level, but they also don’t have much (or any) room to raise it without a trade that trims some salary from the books.

With those financial limitations in mind, the front office is considering some time at first base for utilityman Willi Castro, per Betsy Helfand of the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Twenty-six-year-old Jose Miranda, who bounced back from a 2023 season ruined by shoulder surgery to bat .284/.322/.441 last year (115 wRC+) is the top in-house option at the moment. He’s played 698 big league innings there and graded poorly from a defensive standpoint, although the former second baseman/third baseman was largely learning the position on the fly in 2022 when he tallied 595 of those innings; he’d entered that season with all of 225 career minor league innings at the position.

It seems unlikely that Castro would be a regular option at first, given the value of his versatility. He’s a viable backup at shortstop, second base, third base and anywhere in the outfield. Adding first base to that repertoire only further broadens his importance to the club. There’s been some thought that Castro and his own $6.4MM salary could be a candidate to change hands, though doing so would thin out the Twins’ depth at all those positions and remove one of the team’s best baserunners. With Minnesota at least ostensibly not required to slash payroll any further, trading Castro seems like a scenario to which the front office would be heavily opposed.

Twins Rumors: Lewis, Santana, Paddack

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The Twins are contemplating a full-time move to second base for young infielder Royce Lewis, writes Dan Hayes of The Athletic. Minnesota briefly experimented with Lewis shifting from third base to second base late in the season, but a more permanent move is under consideration. Making the shift at the beginning of a season, when Lewis has an entire spring training exhibition schedule to acclimate to his new defensive environs, would presumably benefit the 25-year-old slugger as opposed to last year’s on-the-fly look, when Lewis logged only eight innings at the position.

Lewis is just one piece of a crowded infield puzzle in Minnesota. The former No. 1 overall pick and top prospect has been playing third base in deference to Carlos Correa but was drafted as a shortstop. From the time he was drafted in 2017, some scouts have questioned whether he’d stick at shortstop or move to third base, second base or perhaps center field. A pair of ACL tears in the same knee in consecutive seasons has probably impacted that decision for the organization as well.

In addition to Lewis and Correa, the Twins will be looking to juggle playing time between top prospect Brooks Lee (the No. 8 overall pick in 2022), Edouard Julien (who posted terrific rookie numbers in ’23 before struggling in ’24), Jose Miranda (who rebounded nicely from a 2023 season ruined by shoulder surgery) and utilityman Willi Castro (.251/.334/.395 with 21 homers, 47 steals in 282 games with the Twins).

Carlos Santana’s potential departure in free agency and the surprising retirement of injury-plagued former top prospect Alex Kirilloff opens some at-bats at first base, which could be handled by Julien and/or Miranda. Lee, considered a better defender at third base than Lewis, would presumably be in line for the bulk of the playing time at the hot corner if he makes the roster. Lee missed considerable time with injury and struggled in his first taste of the big leagues last year, however, so if he opens the season in Triple-A, that’d leave Miranda and Julien to share the corners early in the season, with Castro (who has extensive outfield experience as well) mixing in all over the field. The Twins also have fast-rising prospect Luke Keaschall to consider; the 2023 second-rounder has played second, third, first and center field in the minors and currently ranks 39th on Baseball America’s ranking of the game’s top 100 prospects.

One option the Twins could explore, of course, is a reunion with Santana. The 39-year-old switch-hitter is aiming to play at least three or four more seasons and by all accounts quite enjoyed his time in Minnesota. President of baseball operations Derek Falvey recently told the Twins beat that he’s not ruling out the possibility, even if it would “create some other changes that we have to consider on the roster” (link via Do-Hyoung Park of MLB.com). Santana hit .238/.328/.420 with 23 home runs and won a Gold Glove at first base in 2024 after signing a one-year, $5.25MM deal in Minnesota.

It’s possible that the glut of infield talent could lead a trade of some variety this offseason, though given the team’s payroll situation, trades of veterans on somewhat notable salaries are considered likelier. That could include Castro, who’s projected by MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz to earn $6.2MM in his final season of club control, but there are other areas where the Twins have notable salaries they could shed. Catcher Christian Vazquez and his $10MM salary are one option, and Bobby Nightengale of the Minneapolis Star Tribune wrote recently that there’s an expectation that righty Chris Paddack will also garner some calls this winter. (We ranked Paddack 16th on our list of MLB’s top trade candidates heading into the offseason.)

Paddack, 29 in January, is signed through the 2025 season and will earn a $7.5MM salary next year. He returned for his first full season following a second career Tommy John surgery in 2024 and pitched 88 1/3 innings with a 4.99 ERA. That’s not a flattering number, but a substantial portion of the damage against Paddack came in one nightmare outing where he yielded nine runs in 5 1/3 innings to the Orioles in April. From that point forth, he posted a 4.38 ERA with a solid 22.3% strikeout rate and excellent 5.1% walk rate. He spent the final two months of the season on the injured list due to a forearm strain.

A former top prospect who looked on the cusp of stardom after a dominant rookie season when he gave the Padres 140 2/3 of 3.33 ERA ball with plus strikeout and walk rates, Paddack is still something of a project even as he approaches his 29th birthday. That said, he’s younger than most free agent pitchers and paid roughly in line with what might be expected of an older reclamation project. For instance, Alex Wood ($8.5MM), Wade Miley ($8.5MM) and James Paxton ($7MM) all signed one-year deals in this range coming off injury-shortened seasons of their own last winter.

Paddack’s deal may not be teeming with surplus value, but the Twins also might not need to eat any money in a trade. Dealing him would thin out the team’s rotation supply, but the Twins could still pursue some more cost-effective depth arms to complement Pablo Lopez, Joe Ryan, Bailey Ober, Simeon Woods Richardson and top prospects David Festa and Zebby Matthews, both of whom made their MLB debuts in 2024 (each struggling to varying extents). Prospects Marco Raya and Andrew Morris are also on the near-term horizon.

Twins To Place Jose Miranda On 10-Day Injured List

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The Twins will place Jose Miranda on the 10-day injured list prior to tomorrow’s game with the Giants, manager Rocco Baldelli told reporters (including Betsy Helfand of the St. Paul Pioneer Press).  Utilityman Diego Castillo will have his contract selected from Triple-A to take Miranda’s spot on the active roster, and the Twins will have to make another move to clear space on the 40-man roster.

Lower back tightness has kept Miranda off the field since Wednesday, so the Twins will be able to backdate Miranda’s IL stint to July 11.  With the four-day All-Star break also factoring into the 10-day span, Miranda won’t miss much additional game time if he is able to return after only 10 days, though the Twins will certainly be careful with a player who has emerged as one of their chief offensive weapons.

Miranda seemed to lay claim to the Twins’ third base job with a very solid rookie season in 2022, but then struggled through a rough 2023 campaign that was limited to 40 games due to shoulder surgery.  Royce Lewis’ own injury problems allowed Miranda to get a fresh chance at regular playing time this season, and he has explored for nine home runs and a .325/.366/.522 slash line over 276 plate appearances, translating to a 149 wRC+.  This big year included a place in the history books, as Miranda’s string of 12 consecutive at-bats with a hit matched a Major League record.

Miranda has a .349 BABIP, and between middling hard-contact numbers and a below-average 5.1% walk rate, he is certainly overachieving to some extent — the infielder’s .380 wOBA is well above his .345 xwOBA.  Still, even that xwOBA is well above the league average, and Miranda’s contact is helped by the fact that he is rarely swinging and missing.  His 13.4% strikeout rate is in the 93rd percentile of all batters, even if his chase rate is unimpressive.

This production has been a big reason why the Twins are in possession of an AL wild card spot, so the club can only hope that Miranda’s back problem won’t linger.  Beyond just Miranda’s absence, the Twins’ wider-scale problem is a sudden swath of infield injuries, as Miranda joins Lewis, Kyle Farmer, Alex Kirilloff, and Austin Martin on the club’s 10-day IL.  Star shortstop Carlos Correa was also a late scratch from today’s lineup due to a heel contusion, though there isn’t yet any indication that Correa’s injury is anything but a day-to-day issue.  With so much infield depth missing, Minnesota had to get creative with today’s lineup, moving catcher Christian Vazquez to third base — Jair Camargo was called up from Triple-A earlier this week, so the Twins still had flexibility behind the plate with Vazquez, Camargo, and Ryan Jeffers all available.

Castillo brings some versatility to this mix, as the 26-year-old has already played five different positions and even thrown a couple of innings over his two MLB seasons.  Debuting with the Pirates in 2022, Castillo hit .206/.251/.382 over 283 during his first year in the Show, and was then traded to the Diamondbacks after the season and appeared in just one MLB game during the 2023 campaign.  A flurry of waiver claims this winter saw Castillo join four different organizations before finally landing with Minnesota, via an early April trade with the Orioles.

Twins Option Edouard Julien; Royce Lewis Expected To Return Tuesday

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The Twins have optioned second baseman Edouard Julien to Triple-A St. Paul, per the team’s transaction log at MLB.com. Dan Hayes of The Athletic reported last night that the move was likely on the horizon, as the Twins need to clear roster space for the return of infielder Royce Lewis, who’s expected to join the team tomorrow for their series opener against the Yankees.

Julien, 25, graduated from top prospect status to the Twins’ apparent everyday second baseman last year when he hit .263/.381/.459 with 16 homers in 408 plate appearances as a rookie. Minnesota felt comfortable enough with the Canadian-born slugger at second base that they traded stalwart infielder Jorge Polanco to the Mariners this offseason when looking for ways to pare back the payroll.

Julien hit .223/.330/.500 with seven homers through the end of April, but he’s since fallen into a slump that’s seen him post a bleak .169/.274/.181 slash over a span of 95 trips to the plate. He’s still walking at a hefty 12.6% clip but has also fanned at a 38% rate during that slump (and in 34% of his plate appearances on the season overall). Julien’s extremely patient approach has helped him walk in nearly 15% of his MLB plate appearances, but that patience can border on passivity as well. Jonathan India is the only qualified hitter in baseball who’s swung at fewer pitches than Julien’s 37%.

The monthlong slump will make Julien the roster casualty for the return of Lewis, who’s been Minnesota’s best hitter when healthy dating back to his 2022 debut. Injuries have marred Lewis’ career to date — he’s twice torn his right ACL and has been out since Opening Day due to a quad strain — but the 2017 No. 1 overall draft pick is a .313/.369/.564 hitter (159 wRC+) in 282 MLB plate appearances. He also swatted four homers in 26 postseason playoff appearances last year (in addition to homering in his first at-bat of the 2024 regular season).

With Lewis reclaiming the regular third base job and Julien headed to St. Paul, the Twins’ infield will take on a different look. Jose Miranda has been the team’s primary third baseman and, after a lost 2023 season, has reemerged as a key contributor. The 25-year-old Miranda (26 later this month) is another former Twins top prospect who impressed as a rookie in 2022, popping 15 homers and batting .268/.325/.426 in 483 plate appearances. He tried to play through a shoulder impingement that eventually required surgery last season, hitting just .211/.263/.303 in 40 big league games.

Now that his shoulder is back at full strength, Miranda looks like his old self. He’s taken 151 turns at the plate and delivered a quite-productive .280/.311/.469 slash with six homers and nine doubles. Miranda doesn’t walk much (3.3% this season, 5.3% career) but puts the ball in play at a very high rate (14.6% strikeout rate this year, 17.4% career) and has plenty of extra-base pop. Though he played some second base in the minors, it doesn’t seem likely he’ll do so at this point. He’ll rotate between the infield corners and designated hitter, but utilityman Willi Castro figures to pick up the bulk of playing time at second base. The switch-hitting Castro is out to a .260/.335/.420 start and has experience playing all over the diamond.

The Twins could’ve made a more aggressive roster decision, cutting ties with a struggling veteran instead. But Carlos Santana has rebounded from an awful start to bat .253/.340/.434 over the past 30 days. Kyle Farmer and Manuel Margot both have ugly numbers on the whole, but as Hayes notes, Margot is hitting left-handers fairly well and Farmer is valued both for his defensive versatility and his leadership in the clubhouse. Optioning Julien also preserves depth in a way that parting with someone like Farmer or Margot would not; both players could reject outright assignments to the minors in favor of free agency.

The Twins’ infield crunch falls into the “good problem to have” bucket of cliches. Julien’s demotion certainly doesn’t change the organization’s view that he can be a valuable long-term contributor, but he’ll head to Triple-A for what’s likely to be a relatively short-term reset. Presumably, in the event of an injury in the infield or at just about any non-catcher spot among the team’s position-player corps, Julien would be the first man back up. (Castro could slide right back into a super-utility role or into an everyday outfield role.)

From a service time vantage point, Julien’s slump could potentially cost him, however. He entered the season with 135 days of MLB service. Had he stayed in the majors for good, he’d have been a slam-dunk Super Two player following the 2025 season. It’s still possible he reaches that designation but is now far from a sure thing. Julien has already reached one full year of MLB service, so this assignment won’t impact his timeline to free agency, but it could potentially cost him a fourth trip through the arbitration process.

Byron Buxton Planning To Return To Center Field In 2024

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As noted by Betsy Helfand of the St. Paul Pioneer Press, Twins center fielder Byron Buxton assured fans at this weekend’s TwinsFest that the club’s star defender would be back in center field for the 2024 campaign.

Buxton, 30, was limited to DH-only duties during the 2023 campaign as he battled knee issues before ultimately undergoing knee surgery in October. The nagging injury woes, in addition to stopping Buxton from playing defense last year, may have contributed to his diminished results at the plate last season. In 347 trips to the plate, Buxton slashed a modest .207/.294/.438 that was roughly league average by measure of wRC+. That’s a far cry from the .258/.316/.558 slash line he compiled from 2019 to 2022. The offensive potential Buxton showed during that four-year stretch, when combined with his elite defensive abilities and quality baserunning, made the outfielder one of the league’s most valuable players on a rate basis.

Buxton’s potential has been limited, however, by constant struggles with injuries over the years. Across nine seasons as a big leaguer, Buxton has only appeared in 100 games once, during his 140-game 2017 campaign. Since then, he has averaged just 65 games a season while never appearing in more than 92 in a single campaign. Given his long-standing struggles with staying on the field, the club hoped that by making Buxton their full-time DH in 2022 they would be able to keep him on the field more frequently. That, of course, didn’t pan out, and returning their star center fielder to his natural position has long been acknowledged as the ideal scenario for the club in 2024.

Earlier this offseason, reports indicated that Buxton was fully healed from his autumn knee surgery and was expected to return to baseball activities before the end of the 2023 calendar year, with club officials hoping he would be able to return to regular work in center field in 2024. Since then, Helfand notes that Buxton has resumed baseball activities on a daily basis. Evidently, the return to activity has gone well enough to this point that Buxton and the Twins are confident he’ll be able to act as the club’s every day center fielder to open the year. That may help to take pressure off the club’s front office to find a replacement for center fielder Michael A. Taylor, who stepped in as a regular at the position last year while Buxton was unable to take the field. Internal options to back up Buxton in center currently include the likes of Austin Martin, Nick Gordon, and Willi Castro.

As noted by Helfand, Buxton isn’t the only Twins position player recovering well from offseason surgery. Both first baseman Alex Kirilloff and outfielder Jose Miranda under went surgery back in October and have been progressing well in the run-up to Spring Training. Both youngsters indicated that they hope to be ready to go once camp opens next month. Miranda’s big league career kicked off with a bang in 2022 when he impressed with a .268/.325/.426 slash line in 125 games, but his sophomore season didn’t go nearly as well as he was limited to just 40 games in the big leagues by injuries and ineffectiveness. Kirilloff, meanwhile, enjoyed something of a breakout season in 2023 as he slashed a respectable .270/.348/.445 in 88 games while splitting time at first base with Donovan Solano and Joey Gallo.

Twins Could Pursue First Base Addition

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The Twins snapped the longest postseason losing streak in North American sports this year when they swept the Blue Jays out of the Wild Card round before falling 3-1 in an ALDS loss to the Astros. They’ll head into the offseason facing the potential loss of Cy Young finalist Sonny Gray, but there are also other areas of need on the roster. President of baseball operations Derek Falvey indicated to Bobby Nightengale of the Minneapolis Star Tribune that his club could also be in the market for an addition to their first base mix.

“With [Alex Kirilloff] and with potential external additions, it’ll probably be an area we do spend some time this offseason from free agent or trade perspective,” Falvey said of his team’s first base outlook.

Kirilloff, a longtime top prospect whose career trajectory has been altered by persistent wrist and shoulder injuries, served as the Twins’ primary first baseman when healthy in 2023. Free agents Donovan Solano and Joey Gallo also logged significant time at first base. There’s yet to be any indication the Twins plan to re-sign either. Gallo, in particular, seems likely to depart.

The 26-year-old Kirilloff turned in a very sound .270/.348/.445 batting line with 11 home runs in 319 plate appearances, but he also had multiple shoulder-related IL stints before ultimately undergoing surgery at season’s end. That procedure, Nightengale writes, was actually less invasive than the Twins originally anticipated, and he’s expected to be ready for spring training.

That said, it’s hard to bank on Kirilloff assuming the position on a full-time basis next year. The Twins thought highly enough of the former first-round pick to give him his MLB debut during the 2020 postseason, and he’s now spent parts of three seasons on the MLB roster. However, this past campaign’s 88 games and 319 plate appearances are both career-highs. Kirilloff’s 2021 and 2022 seasons ended with wrist surgery.

There’s little doubting Kirilloff’s raw abilities. He was the 15th overall draft pick in 2016 and hit a combined .324/.381/.525 in the minors — including a gaudy .366/.458/.673 in 53 Triple-A games. Prior to his MLB debut, he peaked as the game’s No. 15 overall prospect at Baseball America and climbed as high as ninth on MLB.com’s top 100 rankings. Even with the past wrist issues and ongoing shoulder troubles in ’23, he was a well above-average hitter. But his ability to remain on the field and the extent to which he can recover from a third notable surgery in three years are both open questions.

The Twins have alternatives at the position. Rookie infielder Edouard Julien, a top-100 prospect in his own right, hit the big league scene with a .263/.381/.459 batting line and 16 home runs as a rookie in 408 plate appearances this season. He’s primarily been a second baseman, but there are questions about his ability to handle that spot long term and Julien already logged some time at first base. With Jorge Polanco entrenched at second base, slotting Julien in at first base and designated hitter could get his bat into the lineup more regularly. Of course, the Twins’ wealth of young infield talent makes Polanco an obvious trade candidate, and if he’s moved, that’d clear a spot for Julien at second base and Kirilloff and/or an external acquisition at first base.

Also in the mix is Jose Miranda — yet another former top prospect who broke through with a terrific rookie showing in 2022 before regressing in 2023 and eventually requiring a shoulder surgery of his own. Miranda batted .268/.325/.426 with 15 home runs in 125 games as a rookie in ’22 but limped to a .211/.263/.303 line in 40 big league games this past season. His work in Triple-A wasn’t any better, and he wound up being diagnosed with a shoulder impingement that resulted in September surgery. Still just 25 years of age, a healthy Miranda could work his way back into the mix as well.

Suffice it to say, the Twins aren’t short on in-house options. The looming possibility of a Polanco trade (thus opening second base for Julien), uncertainty surrounding the health/durability of Kirilloff and Miranda, and the hopeful opening of some at-bats at the designated hitter position could all pave the way for Minnesota to bring in a bat, though. Byron Buxton spent the bulk of the 2023 season as a designated hitter due to lingering complications from last winter’s knee surgery, but the Twins are optimistic that he’ll be able to return to center field in 2024, per Falvey. That’d be a boon both offensively and defensively, if he’s able to do so.

The offseason market at first base isn’t exactly deep in terms of star power, though Rhys Hoskins stands as a prominent name on the open market (assuming his own recovery from a torn ACL progresses as expected). Brandon Belt is also available, though he’s a strict platoon option and bats from the same side of the plate as the left-handed Kirilloff. Buy-low options include Garrett Cooper and old friend C.J. Cron. Pete Alonso’s name has been kicked around the trade market, but Mets president of baseball operations David Stearns said this week that he does not anticipate trading the star slugger (link via Will Sammon of The Athletic).

The Twins are expected to reduce payroll this coming season, albeit not drastically so. Revenue losses stemming from the collapse of their television deal under Diamond Sports Group’s bankruptcy create uncertainty in Minnesota, where Roster Resource currently projects them for a $125MM payroll. Dan Hayes of The Athletic reported earlier this week that the team’s payroll would likely settle between $125-140MM. Trading Polanco ($10.5MM), Max Kepler ($10MM) and/or Christian Vazquez ($10MM) would create some breathing room, as could a trade or non-tender of utility infielder Kyle Farmer (projected $6.6MM arbitration salary, per MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz).

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