9 Bold Predictions for the 2024 Minnesota Twins

There's always danger in setting out to make bold predictions. Most predictions that come true are not bold. They're conservative. It's tautological, but important, to say it: you only get most guesses right if you guess that statistically probable things will happen. It's much more fun, though, to try to predict the improbable. Let's leave probability-driven forecasting to computer models, meteorologists, and tarot card scam artists. I want to try to guess against the grain.

That doesn't mean we have to be wild and crazy, though--at least not in a way detached from reality. On the contrary, I hope to ground all of my predictions in some concrete reality, even if the numbers still say that what I project is unlikely. Ok, here we go.

1. Griffin Jax will strike out 91 or more batters.
In 2004, Juan Rincón struck out 106 batters as a reliever for the Twins. He pitched 82 innings in 77 appearances that season. In each of the next two seasons, Joe Nathan came up not far short of Rincón, with 94 and 95 strikeouts, respectively. When the strikeout surge among relievers really took root and began to grow, the Twins were right in the thick of it.

Just as has happened with starters, though, relievers have steadily lost a percentage of their formerly typical workload in the seasons since then. As a result, even while strikeout rates have climbed, the frequency of individual hurlers compiling gaudy strikeout totals in a season out of the pen has plateaued. Since Nathan's 2006, the most strikeouts by a Twins reliever in any campaign is the 90 managed by Taylor Rogers in 2019.

That will change this season. Jax, who seems so well-suited to the role of high-leverage relief and hardly ever throws a let-up fastball, has had nasty stuff ever since making his complete conversion to the bullpen. He's underachieved in terms of punchouts, though, because of the predominantly horizontal movement profile of his stuff. He's tweaked that this spring, and I'm expecting his strikeout rate to soar past 30%. Given how badly the team needs him in the absence of Jhoan Durán and the durability I expect him to continue to exhibit, Jax has a chance to pitch enough and get enough whiffs to threaten triple digits with his strikeout tally for 2024.

2. Byron Buxton will have a WAR under 2.0.
You didn't expect these all to be positive, did you? While Buxton is the feel-good story of spring training for Twins Territory, the actuarial charts are all against him, and I just don't trust him to have the kind of season we would all like to see. While I'm eager to see him take the field as a defender again, I harbor severe doubt that he can stay both fresh and healthy as a center fielder at this point in his career.

Buxton is a big guy who has dealt with injuries to virtually every part of his body. He's dealt with some back pain during camp. That's unlikely to help a player who has already struggled at times because of a grooved swing and difficulty covering some parts of the strike zone. Since the start of 2022, you've been able to get Buxton out at the bottom of the zone, or by busting him inside. Mistakes go a long, long way against him, but his strikeout rate over the last two years is north of 30% and plate coverage is not a skill that ages well.

Because he needs to see meatballs clearly out of the hand and convert them into barreled balls at such a high rate, Buxton has been a rhythm hitter over the last couple seasons. His wOBA when playing for at least the second day in a row is .364. If he's had at least one day off, though, it's .335, and if it's been three or more, it's under .250. The samples there are small and desperately noisy, because Buxton playing after one or more days off usually means Buxton is playing at something less than 100 percent, but he's 30 now. He's never going to be 100 percent again. Such is baseball; such is life.

I suspect Buxton will get hurt if he tries to play regularly in the outfield, but I'm also not at all sure he'll be the dazzling defender he was in his 20s, even while he's able to take his station there. A full year away from defensive duties is not an easy thing from which to recover, at this age. Between what I suspect will be mostly unsuccessful attempts to keep him fresh and the demands of playing both halves of an inning for the first time since 2022, I expect a rough season for the Twins' franchise player. In fact, I doubt he finishes the season with that mantle still around his shoulders.

3. Royce Lewis will start the All-Star Game at third base.
This one takes some doing. It's an expression of my profound faith in Lewis as a hitter, and of appreciation for his charisma and watchability. Rafael Devers and José Ramírez might both be future Hall of Famers. Alex Bregman is a perennial playoff playmaker heading for a highly lucrative free agency at season's end. Lewis, though, has a chance to outshine them all.

The grand slams and the playoff bombs are fun, but it's the coordinated aggression of Lewis's swing that excites me most. He has the blend of approach and mechanics to be a hitter who consistently not only keeps the line moving in big moments, but hits the telling drive. In the player comment I wrote about him for Baseball Prospectus 2024, I compared Lewis to Juan González at his peak, and I stand by that parallel, in terms of swing style and strength. The difference is that Lewis is also a very good athlete, whom I expect to add value as a defender at third base in his first full campaign at the position.