Go back a few years, and Josh Staumont was one of the nastiest relievers in baseball. He never became a household name or racked up a bunch of saves, but in 2020 and 2021, he had a total of 91 1/3 innings pitched, with a 2.75 ERA and a 29-percent strikeout rate. Since then, however, the wheels have come off, and just when he seemed to be getting back on the right track last summer, his season ended, as he had to undergo surgery to address thoracic outlet syndrome (TOS).
Even at his best, Staumont walked too many opposing batters, and he never induced many ground balls. In his halcyon stretch under the shadow of COVID, though, he had overpowering stuff. His fastball scraped 100 miles per hour and sat at 97, with relative cut and ride action that made it a whiff machine at the top of the zone against left-handed batters. Once he set batters up with that pitch, he used a high-spin curveball to induce chases and punch them out. Lefties whiffed on over 40 percent of their swings against that plunging hook in 2020 and 2021, combined.
Again, the results since the start of 2022 have been ugly. Still, the Twins see something here, and it's not just the ghost of the success he enjoyed before that. He's made a couple of important changes, and one that might not even count as made yet, but which the Twins will be eager to explore. He's also a good fit for their organizational philosophies about pitching and about bullpen usage, assuming he can get healthy and back onto the mound in short order.
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