20 Questions for 20 Twins Pitching Prospects in 2025

[Jamie Cameron]

Is Andrew Morris bigger than a bread box?

Image courtesy of © Chris Tilley-Imagn Images

Now that spring training is here, it’s a good time to take a look at some of the Twins' notable prospects, and a question facing each of them ahead of the 2025 season. In the first part of this series, we looked at hitters. Today, it's pitchers. Some of these development steps will seem obvious. Others will be less so. For ease of navigation, prospects have been listed alphabetically.

Kyle Bischoff (RHP) 
Will an opportunity present itself in the MLB bullpen? Bischoff is a name you need to have on your radar. He’s a 6-foot-2, 25-year-old right-handed pitcher who has a real shot to make the big-league club in a relief role. It’s a sinker, cutter, slider, changeup profile, and he throws hard (sinker up to 97 mph in 2024). He moved all the way from Cedar Rapids to St. Paul last season, throwing 61 1/3 innings and maintaining a stingy 3.09 FIP. Bischoff struck out 30% of the hitters he faced in 2024, although his walk rate is a touch higher than you’d like to see (10%). It’s an MLB-caliber arm. It’s just a matter of opportunity and continued consistent performance matching up.

Adrian Bohorquez (RHP)
Can he improve his strike-throwing? Bohorquez is now a trendy low-minors arm (thanks, Cody Schoenmann). He has plenty of starter traits. His fastball has good shape, and he can really spin it. He struck out 31% of hitters in a short debut at Fort Myers in 2024, but also walked almost 15% of batters. Despite this, he maintained a 3.23 ERA (3.53 FIP) across the Florida Complex League and Low A. He’ll need to get his strike rate up from the low 60s to 65% or higher in order to keep starting, though.

Matt Canterino (RHP)
Will he get a clean run of health? This could have been the question for 10-15 different Twins prospects, but it’s most salient for Canterino. He’s now 27, and he hasn’t been able to make his big-league (or even Triple-A) debut due to a miserable run of injuries. Looking at Canterino’s minor-league numbers from 2022 (his last run of health) invites hype: 37 innings, 1.95 ERA, 35% strikeout rate. I’d leverage Canterino strictly as a reliever at this point. He enters 2025 healthy, at least, and should start the season at St. Paul

Michael Carpenter (LHP)
Will he become the next Twins breakout pitching prospect? You don’t take a pitcher in the 11th round and pay them high 5th-round money ($500,000) unless you are convicted on their ability. Carpenter was the NJCAA Pitcher of the Year, striking out 111 in 78 ⅔ innings. Pre-draft, his arsenal consisted of a low-90s fastball; a curveball with ample depth; and a changeup with good fade. Stop me if you’ve heard this before, but he also offers plus control. I’d expect him to be in the mid-90s by the time he debuts. He’s a breakout pick for me in 2025.

CJ Culpepper (RHP)
Can he sustain his velocity deeper into starts? After recovering from a forearm strain that delayed the beginning of his season, Culpepper thrived. Across 58 ⅓ innings in 2024, he managed a 3.09 FIP, striking out nearly 27% of hitters and walking 7.5%. Culpepper, however, has a challenge to overcome: sustaining his velocity throughout his starts. To this point in his career, he's consistently a few ticks on every pitch when he goes through the order multiple times. It’s a problem he’ll need to solve if he’s going to continue to start.

Jack Dougherty (RHP)
Can he log a healthy season? You’d be forgiven for not knowing who Jack Dougherty is. He missed all of 2024 due to injury. Before he went down, however, he was throwing 96-mph cheese in live bullpens at spring training. Dougherty was drafted in the 9th round in 2023 out of Ole Miss. He’s 6-foot-4 and had a college résumé light on results but heavy on stuff and strikeouts. He’s another candidate to move quickly through the lower levels if he can return to good health.

Ross Dunn (LHP)
Can he continue his improved strike-throwing? Dunn was an atypical Twins draft pick, in that he showed a stuff-over-strikes profile in college at Arizona State. The left-hander had a patchy 2024. He didn’t generate enough whiffs (21.2% strikeout rate), and continued to walk too many (10.6% of opposing batters), although his strike-throwing was significantly improved from his junior year of college. His xFIP (4.46) was much better than his ERA (6.46). He’ll need to continue to shore up his control when he moves to Cedar Rapids.

David Festa (RHP)
Will he add a consistently usable fourth pitch? This question has already been answered for us, kinda, sorta. Festa added a sinker this offseason, hoping to work right-handed hitters inside. After some classification hiccups, he threw a few in his spring debut. Globally, Festa seems to be throwing from a lower, three-quarters arm slot in 2025, so it’ll be worth monitoring all of his pitch shapes. Adding a consistently usable fourth offering and forcing righties to cover a bigger zone moves Festa closer to the middle of the great stuff-wide arsenal continuum.

Tanner Hall (LHP)
Will he recover his command? The scouting report on Hall (4th round in 2023) said that he was an elite strike-thrower with an outstanding changeup. Hall walked an average of 5% of batters in college. In his first professional season, that almost doubled (9.6%). Hall has a very east-west movement profile (more unusual stuff for the Twins), and has a fastball light on velocity, so he’ll have to add a few ticks, regain his elite control, or both to thrive in 2025.

Dasan Hill (LHP)
Will he have a healthy, effective first full professional season? Prospect-loving Twins fans got their first look at Hill in spring training and went into a minor frenzy. The 6-foot-5 19-year-old is already up to 98 mph with his fastball, with an above-average slider and an improving changeup. It’s easy to dream of the vast potential here. The reality is, the Twins can and should take it slow with HIll in his first professional season. Throwing strikes and missing bats are the key indices, but as was true of Charlee Soto last season, the main goal for Year One with Hill is to get through a full professional season with his health intact and his confidence on the rise.

Ty Langenberg (RHP)
Can he find more consistent velocity with his arsenal? Langenberg was the Twins' 11th-round pick in 2023 out of Iowa and is one of the more likely players to make a significant jump forward in 2025. In his first pro season, he pitched 108 innings, holding a 3.28 FIP, striking out 25% of hitters and walking just 6.6%. That's really solid. Langenberg had some fluctuations in his velocity from start to start in the minors. The Twins will want to see consistency in a season in which he should spend the bulk of his time at Double A. Langenberg could be yet another back-end rotation option for the Twins in 2026.

Cory Lewis (RHP)
Does his fastball tick back up to pre-injury velocity? Lewis missed a bunch of time at the beginning of 2024 with a shoulder impingement and became a little lost in the shuffle amid the ascendance of Zebby Matthews and Andrew Morris. Lewis’s fastball has good shape, but it sat at 89 mph in his lone Triple-A start (likely due to being worn down at the end of a long season). He’ll need to live in the 92-94 mph range to factor as a starter in the big leagues. He sat around 89 again in his first Statcast-tracked outing of the spring, but that leaves plenty of time for him to ramp up into the low 90s.

Christian MacLeod (LHP)
Can he add a few ticks to his fastball? The Twins are excellent at helping pitchers add velocity, and they have several arms who could use a little more. Christian MacLeod is a 6-foot-4 left-handed starter with a Clayton Kershaw pitch mix and an outlier fastball shape. He got a smattering of Triple-A innings, in which his fastball sat at 89 mph. He’s an intriguing arm with good deception and some starter-type traits, but he’ll need a few more ticks on the fastball to have a big impact in the bigs.

Zebby Matthews (RHP)
Can he tighten up command of his secondary offerings and learn when to leave the zone? Matthews looked good in his first start of spring, with his fastball sitting around 97 mph. He's an elite strike-thrower, but doesn’t yet have elite command—that ability to locate the ball precisely and to achieve consistent movement patterns. Improved spotting of his secondary offerings is important. Knowing when, how, and where to leave the strike zone and induce batters to chase can help him maximize his diverse arsenal of pitches and become a lock in the Twins rotation for the next half-decade.

Andrew Morris (RHP)
Will a new pitch open up the outer third of the plate to right-handed hitters? Morris added a sinker this offseason (Hunter Brown, here we come). Similarly to David Festa, he wants something to establish the inner half of the plate against right-handed hitters. Morris and the Twins will be betting that this can help Morris generate more swing-and-miss with the stuff that breaks away from those righties. He’ll need to up the 19.6% K rate from Triple A to thrive when he gets a chance with the Twins—which could come this year.

Jaylen Nowlin (LHP)
Can he transition smoothly enough to become a bullpen weapon? I’ve bucketed Nowlin as a relief pitcher at this point. An 11.8 K-BB% isn’t going to work for a starter. Nowlin has plenty going for him, though. A good fastball that sits 93-94 mph and has touched 97 mph fronts the mix, augmented by a great power slider that sits in the low 90s from the left side. He’s probably organizational lefty relief pitcher No. 3, after Danny Coulombe and Kody Funderburk.

Pierson Ohl (RHP)
Can he generate more whiffs in Triple A? Before Matthews took off so marvelously last year, Ohl was the most remarkable strike-throwing Twins prospect. In three professional seasons, he’s never posted a walk rate higher than 4%. Ohl is a little light on velocity and struggles to generate the amount of swing-and-miss you want to see in a starting pitching prospect. He’ll start 2025 at Triple A, since he already has 189 innings under his belt at Double A. He’ll need to up the strikeout rate to factor into the Twins' plans.

Dylan Questad (RHP)
Can he find some consistency in the low minors? Questad, 20, was an Arkansas-committed right-handed prep pick out of Waterford (Wis.) High School. In the Complex last year, he generated plenty of strikeouts (26%) but had real control problems. He walked 29 batters in 28 1/3 innings. His professional career is in its infancy; look for strike-throwing progress in 2025.

Marco Raya (RHP)
Will he thrive the third time through the order? Raya has been in Fort Myers preparing for 2025 since early January. He talked early in spring training about expanding his arsenal to six pitches and working extensively on his changeup to combat platoon issues from left-handed hitters. The Twins will have to ease off the handbrake a little in 2025 and let Raya get after it the third time through the order. How will his frame and stuff handle an increased workload?

Charlee Soto (RHP)
Can we get a repeat order of 2024, please? The Twins' competitive-balance pick from 2023 is now receiving Top-100 prospect buzz. Soto was much better than his 5.23 ERA last season (3.23 FIP). He still has some work to do on control and command, but the fastball has been up to 100 mph early in spring training. Soto added a sinker and cutter in 2024. I’d take him running back similar results at Cedar Rapids in 2025, 100 times out of 100.

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Which Twins pitching prospects are you most excited to see this offseason? What are other questions facing Twins prospects this season? Feel free to add your own in the comments.

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[dxpavelka]

Randy Dobnak?

[thelanges5]

What about Tomah, WI native Connor Prielipp (LHP)? Is he strictly a BP guy going forward? Seems like that would be the best way to keep him healthy and get him to the bigs. He only threw in 9 games LY but looked great. 
 

[Jamie Cameron]

53 minutes ago, thelanges5 said:

What about Tomah, WI native Connor Prielipp (LHP)? Is he strictly a BP guy going forward? Seems like that would be the best way to keep him healthy and get him to the bigs. He only threw in 9 games LY but looked great. 
 

Love Prielipp. I had to leave out a guy or two for the hitter and pitching version of this (Culpepper on hitting side). For Prielipp, just the health piece this year. Long term, I think it's a role questions (SP or RP) but he should be locked into pretty small pitch counts this year so the role from the jump (at AA) will be start and pitch 2-4 innings.

[madtowntwin]

21) Eiberson Castellano. Among this "Talented Twin's Twenty" does this gifted former Phillie's prospect have a Minnesota Snowball's chance of sticking to the roster? Can a deal be struck with Philadelphia who Spring Trains in nearby Clearwater?? Time will tell. Nice piece. Win Twins. 

[tarheeltwinsfan]

Great, concise summaries. Thank you, Jamie.

[Aerodeliria]

Wasn't there a knuckleballer who was able to not spin it and still produce 90+? His name slips my mind. I was really hopeful he'd be making some noise by now...

[Otaknam]

Excellent column! 

[thelanges5]

7 minutes ago, Aerodeliria said:

Wasn't there a knuckleballer who was able to not spin it and still produce 90+? His name slips my mind. I was really hopeful he'd be making some noise by now...

Cory Lewis is in there but it doesn’t mention his knuckleball in the write up. 

[Otaknam]

8 minutes ago, Aerodeliria said:

Wasn't there a knuckleballer who was able to not spin it and still produce 90+? His name slips my mind. I was really hopeful he'd be making some noise by now...

I believe the knuckleballer is Cory Lewis. 

[Jamie Cameron]

9 minutes ago, thelanges5 said:

Cory Lewis is in there but it doesn’t mention his knuckleball in the write up. 

Yeah Lewis' knuckleball is an indisputably great pitch. I think the fastball and the rest of the mix is going to determine his future big league role, though.

[jmlease1]

Nice to see some LHP with real upside in the starting pitcher gaggle; it'll be fun to watch how Carpenter and Hill develop this season. While I don't subscribe to the theory that you need to have a LHP in your rotation, it'd be great to have a quality one emerge and offer something different.

Pitcher development is pretty difficult and there are so many potential potholes. Even guys that are looking great and widely seen as top prospects can flame out right at the precipice. The fact that the Twins have so much depth among their starting pitching prospects reflects that I think, and the need to have as many tickets to the dance as possible.

Lot of fun guys to look through this year, with a bunch in the high minors that are looking ready to get their first shot. That's pretty fun. It should be interesting to see who (if anyone?) will rise up from the lower minors this season: with so many possibilities, I suspect someone will rise, especially the way we've seen guys jump up 2-3 levels in one season recently.

Soto sure looks like he has the upside. Might have been a good risk on the HS kid.

[HerbieFan]

The pitching pipeline is full....which is really exciting.  Pitching is the most expensive/overpaid position in free agency, so hopefully they won't have to dip into that much, if at all.  Now....about the organization's complete inability to develop catching depth.  Or maybe a quality 1B?  Nitpicking I know....

[Dman]

I had lost track of Bischoff last year so nice to have a reminder of just how far he made it last year.  Always nice to have some potential mid to elite bullpen arms in the system.

It's a nice list of arms with most seeming like viable future options at the MLB level.  Hoping for a good season from all them.

[HerbieFan]

Bischoff and Canterino are REALLY interesting future bullpen arms for me...

[Parfigliano]

8 hours ago, dxpavelka said:

Randy Dobnak?

Is it coincidence that the first 3 letters of his 1st name and 1st 2 of his last spell....Rando?

[sampleSizeOfOne]

11 hours ago, dxpavelka said:

Randy Dobnak?

21?

 

I'm still rooting for him...

 

(though probably not included here, as it is hard to consider him a prospect at this point?)

[Aerodeliria]

12 hours ago, Otaknam said:

I believe the knuckleballer is Cory Lewis. 

Tq!

[Aerodeliria]

12 hours ago, thelanges5 said:

Cory Lewis is in there but it doesn’t mention his knuckleball in the write up. 

Tq!

[ashbury]

14 hours ago, dxpavelka said:

Randy Dobnak?

Yeah, I think by this point the Twins may even have gone to the county courthouse and gotten his legal name changed to include that question mark.

[dxpavelka]

4 hours ago, sampleSizeOfOne said:

21?

 

I'm still rooting for him...

 

(though probably not included here, as it is hard to consider him a prospect at this point?)

I still want to know:  If any undrafted college grad has ever made it to the big leagues faster than he did.

 

[DocBauer]

To be honest, I've been pretty disappointed in the arms from the 2023 draf. To be fair, I believe around 3 of them haven't even thrown an inning for the Twins yet, and I can only assume due to injury. And while a couple threw 2-7 innings after being drafted, 2024 really was the first work, or real work, that they've seen. And it's always felt to me as if all the attention and $ was spent on the first few rounds, and probably rightly so.

I think Langenberg has looked very promising from that class though. I'm hoping for a big jump in 2025 from Hall and Dunn. Can Hall find more velocity? Can Dunn find any consistency? And yes, I had forgotten about Dougherty and the early reports on him out of ST last year.

If Morris and Lewis can find just a little more velocity, I believe they are legitimate ML starters. Not saying they are fully polished yet, but with control and decent secondaries, a couple more emphasis sets them up nicely. (Lewis's knuckleball is killer).

Can Culpepper keep his velocity up as well? He's got 7 pitches and mixes them all in. It's my understanding his change is his worst offering however. I'd like to think a little velocity keeps him in the rotation. If he can't maintain it, does he drop a couple pitches and move to the pen?

I'm going to be watching Carpenter, Hill, and Soto as close or closer than almost any arm in the system this upcoming season. A pair of HS arms and a near HS arm, all 3 loaded with potential.

And I keep wondering who steps up from the 2024 class now that we get a chance to see them in action?

 

[madtowntwin]

LHP Michael Carpenter is another pitcher (HS) selected out of Wisconsin - Menominee Falls I believe - In the 11th Round of the 2024 Draft. Do not fear Noah Miller...We've not forgotten you! Even adorned in your AA Dodger Blue....

[Fatbat]

A left out lefty…. Conner Priellip. Must not have any questions 🤷🏼‍♂️

[Major League Ready]

Prielipp's development is the most intriguing question of all for me as far as pitching prospects go.  He might not every throw a major league pitch but he might also have the highest ceiling of any prospect we have.  What a huge boost it would be for Prielipp to achieve his potential.

[Linus]

I’m wondering if Lewis’ knuckleball is good enough that it could be his primary pitch?

[ashbury]

4 hours ago, Linus said:

I’m wondering if Lewis’ knuckleball is good enough that it could be his primary pitch?

I suppose consistency is the biggest hurdle and the reason it's not more common in the majors.  Consistent unpredictability, I mean.  A mis-thrown instance goes from Knuckle ball to Batting Practice ball to Home Run ball in a hurry.

[Linus]

24 minutes ago, ashbury said:

I suppose consistency is the biggest hurdle and the reason it's not more common in the majors.  Consistent unpredictability, I mean.  A mis-thrown instance goes from Knuckle ball to Batting Practice ball to Home Run ball in a hurry.

Ironically after I posted this I opened the strib sports page to see there is an article about his knuckled.  Twins catchers voted it most nasty of the spring.  He’s got a bunch of other pitches- if a couple end up being mlb quality he could really be a unicorn as most knuckleballers have nothing else.

[ashbury]

3 minutes ago, Linus said:

Ironically after I posted this I opened the strib sports page to see there is an article about his knuckled.  Twins catchers voted it most nasty of the spring.  He’s got a bunch of other pitches- if a couple end up being mlb quality he could really be a unicorn as most knuckleballers have nothing else.

Under appreciated is that a knuckleball specialist has to have something else, same as any pitcher must be more than a one-trick pony.  Even the Niekros had enough of a fastball to keep the hitters honest.  No hitter likes to swing through an 83-MPH "heater" because he was sitting on a 65-MPH offering.

[Linus]

11 minutes ago, ashbury said:

Under appreciated is that a knuckleball specialist has to have something else, same as any pitcher must be more than a one-trick pony.  Even the Niekros had enough of a fastball to keep the hitters honest.  No hitter likes to swing through an 83-MPH "heater" because he was sitting on a 65-MPH offering.

Yep but imagine the heater being 93 or whatever he throws plus some sort of legit breaking ball.  I don’t recall any knuckleballers with that.  That would be really fun to watch.