The Minnesota Twins must replace 40% of their 2023 roster value

December 4, 2023 Sports Gist MLB, Other Sports 0

Aug 16, 2022; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; Minnesota Twins starting pitcher Sonny Gray (54) prepares to hand off the ball to manager Rocco Baldelli as he changes pitchers against the Kansas City Royals in the seventh inning at Target Field. Mandatory Credit: Bruce Kluckhohn-USA TODAY Sports

The Minnesota Twins will need to replace 40% of their 2023 roster value

Minnesota Twins outfield recognized in new t-shirts from Breaking T! - Twinkie Town

 

 

Minnesota’s top three free agent pitchers have signed within the last week, leaving a clear and significant gap in the Twins’ rotation.

How will the front office compensate for the departures of Sonny Gray, Kenta Maeda, and Emilio Pagan, who accounted for roughly half of the value generated by Twins pitchers last season?

The story of the 2023 Twins pitching staff was the gains they made following an underwhelming 2022 campaign: From one year to the next, Minnesota improved from 20th among MLB teams in fWAR (10.7) to fourth (19.7).

Conversely, the story of this offseason so far for the Twins pitching staff has been losses — specifically, the confirmed departures of three pitchers who were instrumental in driving this year-over-year improvement.

Sonny Gray, Kenta Maeda, and Emilio Pagan all made significant strides in terms of output, combining for 7.9 fWAR. That figure accounts for virtually the whole 9-WAR jump from below-average in 2022 (10.7) to elite in 2023 (19.7), and it accounts for 40% of Minnesota’s overall pitching WAR this season.

Given their contributions to one of the league’s finest pitching staffs, it’s no wonder that these three free agents were in great demand and among the first to hit the market. Each received a contract that beyond many expectations, preventing the Twins from really considering reunions with any of the three.

In some ways, these players and their own journeys represent the path to another top-tier pitching staff next year. The Twins need other players to step up and break through in the same ways as this trio just did:

Gray was more on the verge of becoming a dependable frontline starter in 2022, battling durability difficulties that limited him to 120 innings. He put it all together in 2023 and had a career year. Joe Ryan and Bailey Ober appear to be in similar positions to Gray a year ago, with the potential to advance provided they can stay healthy and committed.
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Maeda didn’t pitch at all in 2022. He was rehabbing from Tommy John surgery, which would have let him to return in 2023, which would have earned the 35-year-old a $24 million contract in free agency. The similarity to Chris Paddack is obvious here, and Paddack has a head start on Maeda in that he has already successfully returned to the major-league mound.
In 2022, Pagan… well, we all know how that turned out. Despite possessing the raw stuff and ability to keep the team’s faith, he exploded on the pitch in key moments. However, the unpredictability of relief pitching works both ways, and talented arms may sometimes connect in an instant. There are numerous other players in Minnesota’s bullpen mix who could make a Pagan-like leap next year, with the return of flame-thrower Matt Canterino looming large.

Of course, even if the Twins are able to compensate for some of these significant free agent losses through internal improvements, there is no doubting that they must turn outside to refill their pitching staff, which has a few established weak spots in addition to obvious openings.

This front staff has shown it has no desire to outbid the competition in free agency. If they make any acquisitions in this area, they will most likely be of a lower caliber (think J.A. Happ) or a high-risk, high-reward enterprise.

More than likely, the Twins will try to replace these pitchers using the same route they used to get all three in the first place: trading for several years of control at a reasonable price. In each case, the front office used its pitching depth (Chase Petty, Brusdar Graterol, Taylor Rogers) to acquire target arms, including Paddack. This approach has its own premium, but given the team’s bothersome constraint, it may be financially doable.

How close can they come to replacing the upside and stability they just lost, and what will they have to give up to do so? These are the questions looming as the Twins reckon with the finality of Gray, Maeda and Pagan officially moving on, leaving critical roles in the rotation and bullpen vacant.

I suspect that as usual the Twins front office will get creative and show patience. But options are prone to start coming off the board quickly as the Winter Meetings get underway on Monday.

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