Nine Deals, One Clear Win: Revisiting the Twins' 2025 Trade Deadline

[Mike Sixel]

Only judging an action after you see all the effects is kind of meaningless. You can't predict injuries, or luck. You can have a good outcome from a bad decision.

The question is.... Given what falvey knew at the time, were the moves good? I think they all made sense except for varland. 

Judging these solely on this year is silliness, truly. 

[arby58]

For several of these deals, adding up the wins and losses for 2026 misses the point. Castro/Bader, for example, were not going to re-sign with the Twins, and the Twins were not going to the play-offs last year, so it is impossible to judge those trades as negatives in terms of value for the Twins. While they have little chance of positive impact on the Twins in 2026, that wasn't the point of those trades.

 

[GopherMike]

Stewart pitched two innings and then got injured again.

We could have traded him for a bucket of hot dog water and the move would have been fine.

[karcherd]

4 hours ago, IndianaTwin said:

Correct.

Outman isn't holding back a prospect. His role is pinch runner (4 of 4 in stolen bases) and defensive replacement. He's started only once in the last two weeks (and got a hit, by the way). Interestingly, his WPA is actually a tiny positive for the year. He's pretty much the second coming of Terrance Gore. 

The role that Outman is holding down is not necessary for this team, roster a player to not play is ludicrous.  Before the injuries to the OF's in St. Paul, they could have called one up and there would have been plenty of AB's to split between Larnach, Wallner, Martin and whichever prospect between the corner OF spots and DH.  They all could be playing 4 to 5 days a week, it just means Bell is at 1B which is what he was signed for.

[soyouresayingtheresachance]

I was happy Jax was traded. Very glad he was removed from the team. Massively overrated with a bad attitude. Getting Taj for him was great. 

As most have said, I was also upset Varland was traded. Made no sense. Best reliever in the AL now. Rojas has potential, but I dont see his future as a starter. So Best case scenario is we hope he becomes Varland? Absolutely terrible trade. 

I hope Tait and Abel live up to the hype. Abel was looking decent before injury. I haven't seen Tait play but I've heard he may not have the defense to stick at Catcher? That would be a huge letdown. 

The other trades are whatever. Expiring contracts for what we could get. 

[Bangkok Twins Fan]

22 hours ago, tony&rodney said:

To some extent the July trades may have hinted at a lack of confidence in the Twins young pitchers (Woods Richardson, Matthews, Festa, Morris). If your reputation was supposedly connected to building a strong pitching cohort it seemed odd to go to extreme lengths to add pitching prospects (Abel, Rojas,etc.), while jettisoning established and controlled relief pitchers (Duran, Jax, Varland, Stewart). The trade of the out of favor Griffin Jax for Taj Bradley, at least, brought back an interesting albeit struggling pitcher. 

I tend to never think of trades in terms of wins and losses but prefer to see how a transaction improves the roster, whether that is to improve balance or talent. I'm not sure Falvey (or whomever was in charge) had all of their wits about them last July.

Thing is .... the Twins did gain a few players who could help the team (Bradley, Abel, Rojas) and I'll just hope these players progress quickly and become important for the Twins. What is gone ain't coming back.

Very good point. While we would love to have the likes of Duran, Jax and Varland in the bullpen this season, we DID get back some pretty good players in return. Some of those players (such as Tait) may take another year or two to contribute, but it wasn't a total disaster. If pitchers like Bradley, Abel, and Rojas can stay healthy, we may come out looking pretty darn good before the dust settles. 

[JD-TWINS]

23 hours ago, thelanges5 said:

I don’t hate the individual trades so much as the number of total trades (except Varland) The lack of meaningful moves/signings in the offseason makes it even worse. Of course the architect (Falvey) is gone, but what was the plan here?

The OWNERSHIP that didn’t want to spend any money is still here though……..so we have that to look forward to for the foreseeable future.

[JD-TWINS]

9 hours ago, soyouresayingtheresachance said:

I was happy Jax was traded. Very glad he was removed from the team. Massively overrated with a bad attitude. Getting Taj for him was great. 

As most have said, I was also upset Varland was traded. Made no sense. Best reliever in the AL now. Rojas has potential, but I dont see his future as a starter. So Best case scenario is we hope he becomes Varland? Absolutely terrible trade. 

I hope Tait and Abel live up to the hype. Abel was looking decent before injury. I haven't seen Tait play but I've heard he may not have the defense to stick at Catcher? That would be a huge letdown. 

The other trades are whatever. Expiring contracts for what we could get. 

You got the crystal ball out on Rojas as a potential starter…..at age 23?

How did Louie look as a starter at 23?

Louie pitched in his first 5 games at MLB level at age 24.

At age 26 he was 0-6 with a 7.61 ERA.

Probably need to pump the breaks on breaking down Rojas value as a starter. Thus, the value of the trade is far from being determined.

[JD-TWINS]

9 hours ago, soyouresayingtheresachance said:

I was happy Jax was traded. Very glad he was removed from the team. Massively overrated with a bad attitude. Getting Taj for him was great. 

As most have said, I was also upset Varland was traded. Made no sense. Best reliever in the AL now. Rojas has potential, but I dont see his future as a starter. So Best case scenario is we hope he becomes Varland? Absolutely terrible trade. 

I hope Tait and Abel live up to the hype. Abel was looking decent before injury. I haven't seen Tait play but I've heard he may not have the defense to stick at Catcher? That would be a huge letdown. 

The other trades are whatever. Expiring contracts for what we could get. 

Very good point on trades other than Jax - Duran - Varland ……….they were whatever! I don’t get why people here fixate on being concerned about the Brock Stewart trade. He pitched 3 2/3 for Dodgers last year and went on IL …… just started pitching again at MLB level last week. He’s never thrown many innings …. 37 - 15 - 27 innings for ‘25-‘24-‘23 respectively.

Coulombe - Bader - Castro - Paddack - France  were all free agents & gone in 2 months from the deadline……… anyone that doesn’t think moving Carlos Correa isn’t being rational. Would have been nice to spend at least 50% of $$ saved in Correa trade.

[JD-TWINS]

20 hours ago, jmlease1 said:

Ranking trades based solely on their impact for the Twins 2026 MLB roster is useless.

It's still too soon to really evaluate most of these deals.

Losing Varland sucks, but if Rojas can be a guy then it still might not be a bad deal overall, especially if Roden gets healthy. The Duran deal still looks like it might be very good: Abel looked great before getting hurt (so waving off his contributions to 2026 while praising Duran's is fairly dumb) and Tait might be the catcher of the future. You have to give up something to get something, and these deals weren't made solely with 2026 in mind, so evaluating them only through that lens is kind of absurd.

And the Outman/Stewart deal is pretty meaningless too: Outman has been mostly useless, but Stewart is perpetually hurt. While I wouldn't have made that deal, it's not like you can count on Stewart when planning a bullpen. He's like a bonus if he throws. The Castro deal had zero impact on 2026, but it also had little impact on 2025 for the Twins, negative impact for the Cubs, and Gallagher might be something useful. How is it this low even with such a narrow lens?

I guess, congrats on getting me to comment?

Rojas is 23 with 3 pitches with Plus potential.

At 23 Louie had 1 pitch and didn’t see MLB. At age 26 Louie was 0-6 with a 7.61 ERA. With health, Rojas SEEMS to have #3 maybe #2 starter stuff.

Louie has made a big shift mentally - he deserves being lauded here for what he’s doing so far in ‘26! The trade of Louie for a left handed power pitcher that’s FIVE years younger seems to make a bunch of sense to me.

[killercarewoliva]

On 5/11/2026 at 8:55 AM, Over The Hill Again said:

Said it then, still feel it now: the Varland trade not only made no tactical sense but also came across as a big middle finger to the fanbase. 

My heart sank when right at the end varland was gone and a falvey said we love Louie but it was a deal we couldn't pass up. he ruined the team with his horrible mistakes at the trade deadline except for Bradley. now ownership is going to keep paying the bills and not reinvesting any money into the team. just picking up released players and this could go on for several years. the team cannot survive in this crazy money environment the way they are operating things. 60 years being a follower of the Minnesota twins and it's getting worse than ever. second base and third base currently need to be put back into AAA and I think we all thought he would go down too. but he's doing well. Right field needs to go down and there are people who could brighten our days a little bit when it comes to baseball in AAA.

[Riverbrian]

3 hours ago, JD-TWINS said:

Rojas is 23 with 3 pitches with Plus potential.

At 23 Louie had 1 pitch and didn’t see MLB. At age 26 Louie was 0-6 with a 7.61 ERA. With health, Rojas SEEMS to have #3 maybe #2 starter stuff.

Louie has made a big shift mentally - he deserves being lauded here for what he’s doing so far in ‘26! The trade of Louie for a left handed power pitcher that’s FIVE years younger seems to make a bunch of sense to me.

I agree.

Will it work out? That remains to be seen but trading 60 to 80 innings a year for 150 to 200 inning a year is a move you make. You trade bullpen for starters when you get the chance. Quality of course being the key. 

Doesn't always work out but sometimes it does.

The Twins acquired Abel, Tait, Mendez, Bradley, Rojas, Rodan and Outmann.

It is now up to the Twins to turn these deals into winning deals. If the Twins fail to develop who they acquired... they will lose the deals in the end. We are nowhere near making that determination so this article is a little premature. 

I do disagree in regards to Stewart and Outman. I was OK with that deal at first but I'm now against it. 

If this is all Outman is going to be utilized for. This was basically giving Stewart away and I don't think of Stewart as a low value... just move him off the roster deal. 

You are correct about Stewart's injury history but with the state of our current bullpen. He should be on our injured list. If this is what we are doing with Outman... we should have traded Stewart for a 19 year old that is years from the 40 man.   

The Dodgers kept him through the off-season. The Dodgers like all teams have a ton of 40 man pressure. It's a tough 40 man to remain on.

Stewart could have been booted off the 40 man roster this off-season but the Dodgers booted others off the 40 man instead including Banda. The Dodgers also could have booted Outman off the 40 man roster at any point during the time he was burning up his options. They also didn't... they kept Outman. If he has no value to other clubs... he would sail through the DFA process.  

I just don't think this was a deal of players that the teams didn't care about.

I think both teams saw value and I think other teams saw value as well or they would have been DFA'd already. It's up to the Twins to make this trade a win and I don't believe they will.   

[Linus]

On 5/11/2026 at 9:08 AM, tony&rodney said:

To some extent the July trades may have hinted at a lack of confidence in the Twins young pitchers (Woods Richardson, Matthews, Festa, Morris). If your reputation was supposedly connected to building a strong pitching cohort it seemed odd to go to extreme lengths to add pitching prospects (Abel, Rojas,etc.), while jettisoning established and controlled relief pitchers (Duran, Jax, Varland, Stewart). The trade of the out of favor Griffin Jax for Taj Bradley, at least, brought back an interesting albeit struggling pitcher. 

I tend to never think of trades in terms of wins and losses but prefer to see how a transaction improves the roster, whether that is to improve balance or talent. I'm not sure Falvey (or whomever was in charge) had all of their wits about them last July.

Thing is .... the Twins did gain a few players who could help the team (Bradley, Abel, Rojas) and I'll just hope these players progress quickly and become important for the Twins. What is gone ain't coming back.

I think you are correct about the trades indicating a lack of confidence in Matthew’s, Festa etc.  And they have been proven correct so far. 
Regarding trading the expiring contract players we win those trades automatically because we weren’t bringing them back and their contributions for the rest of 2025 were not needed because the Twins weren’t winning. Seems like this is the kind of trade Falvey had success with. 

[David Maro]

Plain and simple you don't gut your BP on a team that has a starting staff that has a hard time going 5 innings. And now you see what that has done for this season. The FO has been looking across the waiver wire to bring one dead arm pitcher after another. 

As for players like France or Bader and Castro trading them was moves that were ok to make. The team was going nowhere and they were FA at seasons end. And finding someone to take C4 was basically the same move as the Donaldson move. And now seeing the injury C4 has that maybe a career changer.

[TNtwins85]

On 5/11/2026 at 12:17 PM, Trov said:

Who would you use to replace him with?  Who do you want to sit on the end of the bench to pinch run and play defense at end of games instead of him? If you want a prospect called up for Outman, than you really want Wallner, Larnch, Martin, or Buck's time to get cut down. Possibly Bell as well since he mostly DH's and any of them could DH or give a prospect chance to DH.  Point is, you are not replacing Outman in the lineup, you are replacing someone else, or just asking the prospect to sit on bench and not get chance to hit.  It is not about Outman, his roll is limited. 

Kyler Fedko couldn’t be any worse then James outman. Probably would love to sit at the end of a major league bench and provide what you stated? If the bar is a guy who can hit .125 and play shaky CF and ok LF and RF and getting a few pinch running appearances I think you try Fedko out for a few weeks. Can’t be any or much worse and he’s a righty.