A Decade Later: The Twins Had One of MLB’s Biggest Draft Misses

[Cody Christie]

Image courtesy of Seth Stohs, Twins Daily

The MLB Draft is always filled with promise, potential, and projection. For the Minnesota Twins, the 2015 draft offered the rare luxury of a top-10 selection. It was the kind of pick that could shape the franchise’s future for years to come. Unfortunately, it became a selection that fans and front-office members would rather forget. Minnesota used that prized pick on Tyler Jay, a hard-throwing left-handed pitcher from the University of Illinois. The decision and Jay’s subsequent arduous journey have come to represent one of the franchise’s biggest draft misses in recent memory.

At the time of the draft, there were reasons to be excited. Jay was dominant as a reliever for the Illini, emerging as one of the best college bullpen arms in the country. During his final season in Champaign, he posted a 1.08 ERA with 76 strikeouts in just over 66 innings. His mid-90s fastball and devastating slider made him an untouchable force in late innings, and his athletic delivery and build gave scouts hope he could transition to a starter in the professional ranks.

But there were red flags that now seem hard to ignore. Illinois leaned heavily on Jay during his junior season, often using him for multi-inning saves and high-leverage situations multiple times a weekend. That kind of workload for a college reliever carries risk, and in Jay’s case, the effects showed up not long after he turned pro.

The Twins believed Jay had the stuff to start in pro ball, a gamble that has burned many organizations trying to stretch dominant college relievers into rotation work. The transition never clicked. He struggled to adjust to the routine, saw his velocity dip, and by 2017, injuries became the story. A shoulder impingement cost him most of the season, and his 2018 campaign was equally forgettable. When healthy enough to pitch, he was ineffective, and any thought of him rising quickly through the system faded fast.

By 2019, Minnesota was ready to move on. The Cincinnati Reds outright bought his contract from the Twins in a rare transaction that showed how far Jay’s stock had fallen. The change of scenery didn’t lead to a revival. He was released in 2020 during the pandemic shutdown, and at that point, his career appeared over. But Jay soon discovered that part of his struggles came from something no coach or trainer could have foreseen. He had eosinophilic esophagitis, a rare autoimmune disorder that affects the esophagus, making it difficult to eat, maintain weight, and build stamina.

The correct diagnosis and treatment arrived far too late to save his early professional career. Jay spent three years out of baseball, unsure if he’d ever return. But in 2022, he signed with the Joliet Slammers of the independent Frontier League. It was a humbling stop for a former first-round pick, but Jay showed enough to catch the eye of the Mets, who offered him a minor league deal the following year.

The journey finally came full circle in April 2024 when Jay made his long-delayed major league debut with the Mets, nearly nine years after the Twins called his name on draft night. It was a feel-good moment, even if it came in a different uniform and long after Minnesota’s plans for him had expired. As of this season, he’s still toiling in Triple-A for the Milwaukee Brewers, chasing the big-league dream that seemed to vanish years ago.

The sting of that 2015 miss becomes even sharper when considering who the Twins could have selected instead. Austin Riley, who went 41st overall to Atlanta, is now one of the best power-hitting third basemen in baseball and a two-time All-Star. Ian Happ, selected ninth by the Cubs, has three Gold Gloves and 20 rWAR for his career. Walker Buehler, taken 24th by the Dodgers, developed into a solid starter before Tommy John surgery sidelined him in 2022 and 2023. Brandon Lowe, drafted in the third round by Tampa Bay, blossomed into an All-Star second baseman and could certainly add something to the Twins lineup.

Any one of those names would have changed the trajectory of the Twins’ rebuild. Instead, the sixth overall pick turned into a lost asset, a player who battled injury, role confusion, and a rare medical condition before finally scraping his way to the majors in a different organization.

To be fair, the Twins weren’t alone in missing on pitching that year. Top arms like Dillon Tate (4th overall) and Carson Fulmer (8th overall) also failed to meet expectations. But that provides little consolation when so much offensive talent sat on the board. Minnesota believed Jay could buck the trend of college relievers struggling to become pro starters. It was a gamble that ultimately failed to pay off.

In hindsight, the Jay pick represents a hard lesson about risk assessment and player development. The choice to force a reliever into a starter’s path and the failure to foresee the physical wear Illinois had already placed on his arm helped turn a top-six pick into one of the great "what-ifs" in franchise history.

For Jay, the story is at least one of perseverance. He could have walked away from baseball after being cut loose in 2020. Instead, he continued working, identified the source of his health struggles, and clawed his way to the big leagues. His story may yet have more chapters to write.

For the Twins, however, the chapter closed long ago, and it remains a painful reminder that in baseball’s most important draft moments, one wrong decision can echo for years.

What other draft mistakes have the Twins made over the last decade? Leave a comment and start the discussion. 

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[ashbury]

Terry Ryan had a reputation for being conservative, but he would gamble.  Putting Sano in RF was one such, Tyler Jay was a different type.

[dxpavelka]

10 minutes ago, ashbury said:

Terry Ryan had a reputation for being conservative, but he would gamble.  Putting Sano in RF was one such, Tyler Jay was a different type.

Putting Sano in RF wasn't a gamble.  It was just plain stupid.

 

[ashbury]

6 minutes ago, dxpavelka said:

Putting Sano in RF wasn't a gamble.  It was just plain stupid.

 

Since Terry Ryan wasn't a stupid man, this kind of reply winds up being a conversation stopper.

[DocBauer]

What ultimately was so disappointing, IMO, is that Jay's floor appeared to be a quality late inning LH arm out of the pen. And he never became even that. 

[Rod Carews Birthday]

Things like this happen (to every team).  That is why and how the MLB draft is massively different than the NFL or NBA drafts which are much more projectable -- and even those teams miss a lot.  In baseball, it's a pretty big crapshoot as to who will actually progress enough to become a major league player, let alone a star.  This one didn't work out, but so did many, many others for the Twins, and for every ML team.  

[dxpavelka]

1 hour ago, ashbury said:

Since Terry Ryan wasn't a stupid man, this kind of reply winds up being a conversation stopper.

Which doesn't change the fact that putting Sano in RF was stupid.

 

[jorgenswest]

On 6/23/2025 at 6:00 AM, Cody Christie said:

What other draft mistakes have the Twins made over the last decade?

In your title you called it a miss. You conclude with mistake. Those words carry very different weights.

A mistake has a higher threshold. If it is a mistake then there is a lesson to be learned. Perhaps the Twins should never draft a pitcher in the first round since all pitchers come with a huge injury risk. At the time of the draft there was even more worry about the workload of a college starter than there is now. College relievers started getting drafted earlier. Perhaps the lesson learned was to never draft a college reliever in the first round.

I don’t know if there is a lesson to be learned here. I still want the Twins to risk drafting pitchers. This is definitely a draft miss. Misses happen. Tyler Jay was drafted with the 6th pick. Only 13 of players form the 6 hole have surpassed 10 career WAR. Only two of the thirteen are pitchers. Rocco Baldelli is 13th on the list with 10.2 WAR in his career..

Draft with the 6th pick and the norm is a miss but maybe a lesson is to be learned. Perhaps pitchers should not ever be drafted so early. Only two have surpassed 10 WAR from that spot. On the other hand if you have a chance to get a Zack Grienke or Zack Wheeler it might be worth the risk of a miss.

[Sjoski]

A bittersweet read for sure.

Just wondering,  if  you weren’t a starter in college… why would you be one in the majors?

The Twins tried to convert Tyler Jay, and it backfired.

For a team with little room for error, turning a top-10 pick into a project cost them more than the loss of an impact player — you have to toss in the $3.8M bonus that Jay was paid too. 

[Blyleven2011]

5 hours ago, ashbury said:

Since Terry Ryan wasn't a stupid man, this kind of reply winds up being a conversation stopper.

Terry Ryan is an intelligent baseball executive  ...

Ryan took alot of risk in the first round , he took alot of pitchers that didn't fulfill their potential  ...

I don't hold that against him like some do , every team needs pitching and Ryan's need of acquiring pitching was through the draft or some trades , he probably did better at trades for pitching than drafting pitchers in the first round .. 

[Bodie]

5 hours ago, dxpavelka said:

Putting Sano in RF wasn't a gamble.  It was just plain stupid.

 

Only because it was Sano's brain inside Sano's body...

[cheeseheadgophfan]

That entire Twins draft was a total bust.....the only guys drafted that saw an inning of PT with the Twins were Jovani Moran, Cody Stashek and Lamonte Wade.

YUCK

[jkcarew]

The total combined career bWAR for players signed by the Twins in the 2015 draft sits at 4.1.

4.8 of that is tied up in LaMonte Wade. 😶

 

[dxpavelka]

5 hours ago, Bodie said:

Only because it was Sano's brain inside Sano's body...

Any brain issue resides with anyone thinking Sano was a RF.

[big dog]

"At the time of the draft, there were reasons to be excited."

You take a Big 10 reliever that early, you are going to excite people for all the wrong reasons. I was definitely excited, but in a very negative way.

[Doctor Wu]

To be fair, the Twins weren’t alone in missing on pitching that year. Top arms like Dillon Tate (4th overall) and Carson Fulmer (8th overall) also failed to meet expectations. 

That sums it up nicely. Even after all the analysis and projections, the baseball draft is truly a game of chance. We drafted a good arm but it didn't pan out. Let's do it again, but hopefully with better luck. And luck it often comes down to. I only hope that misses like that one don't prevent the Twins from taking the chance on more pitchers with upside. We still need those types of pitchers in the system. 

[Otaknam]

Monday morning quarterbacking. I think all teams have made drafting mistakes like this, which confirms how difficult it is to project baseball talent. 

[Fire Dan Gladden]

Funny how no comments here are addressing the fact he had an unknown, hard to diagnose medical issue that severely curtailed his progression. Far easier to attack the FO as a bad draft decision.

I too am not a big fan of these Monday morning QB articles. Woulda, shoulda, coulda...

[ToddlerHarmon]

The real story here isn't the Twins' draft judgment. It is the story of Jay's perserverance. That's the story I'd rather have read. Maybe it has been written elsewhere?

[KnoblauchWasFramed]

Below is a post I made back on 04/13/2022 talking about the Twins horrible draft ,missed on high draft pick pitchers;

It is truly amazing on how quick the Twins will highly draft, or trade for, a pitcher with all of the potential in the world to greatly impact the Twins rotation for years to come and then turn that pitcher into a bullpen option.  Or worse, the pitcher never even has a career.

2010 (RD – Pick)

Alex Wimmers (1-21) – 0 Career Starts

Pat Dean (3-20) - 9 Career Starts

2011

Hudson Boyd (1-50) – 0 Career Appearances

Madison Boer (2-27) – 0 Career Appearances

Corey Williams (3-27) – 0 Career Appearances

2012

Jose Berrios (1-32) – 148 Career Starts

Luke Bard ( 1-42)   – 3 Career Starts

Mason Melotakis (2-3) - 0 Career Appearances

JT Chargois (2-12) - 0 Career Starts

2013

Kohl Stewart (1-4) - 9 Career Starts

Ryan Eades (2-4)  – 0 Career Starts

Stephen Golsalves (4-4) – 4 Career Starts

2014

Nick Burdi (2-5) - 0 Career Starts

Michael Cederoth (3-5) – 0 Career Appearances

Jake Reed (5-5) - 1 Career Start

John Curtis (6-5) - 5 Career Starts

Jorge Alcala (IFA) - 0 Career Starts (Currently In Bullpen)

Jhoan Duran (IFA) - 0 Career Starts (Currently In Bullpen)

2015

Tyler Jay (1-6) - 0 Career Appearances (Currently Out Of Baseball)

2016

Griffin Jax (3-16) - 14 Career Starts (Currently In Bullpen)

2017

Blayne Enlow (3-1) – On 40 Man Roster (AAA)

[Wedman13]

On 6/29/2025 at 11:38 AM, ashbury said:

Terry Ryan had a reputation for being conservative, but he would gamble.  Putting Sano in RF was one such, Tyler Jay was a different type.

It's not just Jay.  The 2010's, aside from Buxton and Berrios were brutal 1st round picks.  Hitting on 2 of 15, not good.

[Wedman13]

8 hours ago, ToddlerHarmon said:

The real story here isn't the Twins' draft judgment. It is the story of Jay's perserverance. That's the story I'd rather have read. Maybe it has been written elsewhere?

Is this sarcasm?  I'd love to read that also, as there are thousands of players who sacrificed greatly but never made it. (A la Costner in Bull Durham).  But as a twins forum I think it's best to focus on outcomes, and performance-wise, he and the other 2010's simply didn't produce.

[DocBauer]

11 hours ago, Doctor Wu said:

To be fair, the Twins weren’t alone in missing on pitching that year. Top arms like Dillon Tate (4th overall) and Carson Fulmer (8th overall) also failed to meet expectations. 

That sums it up nicely. Even after all the analysis and projections, the baseball draft is truly a game of chance. We drafted a good arm but it didn't pan out. Let's do it again, but hopefully with better luck. And luck it often comes down to. I only hope that misses like that one don't prevent the Twins from taking the chance on more pitchers with upside. We still need those types of pitchers in the system. 

When you look back on that draft, there were some quality players that came out of the 1st round. There always are. But IIRC, it was considered to be a poor draft in regard to top end talent. And the Twins needed pitching. Again, IIRC, Jay wasn't a normal reliever as he often pitched more than 1 inning, and had a couple solid offerings. It was a gamble for sure, but I'm still not sure it wasn't a gamble worth taking at the time. As unpredictable as the ML draft is, sometimes any year's draft can be shallow or deep, just like any draft. Perhaps the mistake was drafting a talent arm that was needed in the system vs just drafting the BPA. 

And I've already stated my disappointment in how Jay turned out.

But I agree with @Doctor Wuthat I sure don't want the Twins to never take an arm in the 1st round again. In fact, in THIS upcoming draft, there's only about 3 college bats that I feel really good about. But there's also about 3 or 4 arms that should be available when the Twins pick with really good upside. Despite doing a great job with talented arms later in the draft, I wonder if this isn't the year to lean in to a college arm again and start with some clay already above average.

[big dog]

23 hours ago, Otaknam said:

Monday morning quarterbacking. I think all teams have made drafting mistakes like this, which confirms how difficult it is to project baseball talent. 

Drafting is hard, every team has more misses than hits, but I don't think that excuses the team from using a very high pick to choose a reliever and try to make him a starter. That's a great strategy for, say, a fourth-round pick. Given how hard drafting is, wouldn't someone with a real track record have been a better choice for a top-10 pick?

Just explaining every mistake as "well, drafting is hard" ignores the possibility that even ignoring hindsight there were hundreds of players to choose from with that pick. What was special about Jay? A couple of very good seasons as a reliever, just like the career of an enormous number of failed starters.