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Over the past two years, starting with their open pronouncement that they'd be "right-sizing" payroll in the aftermath of a postseason breakthrough, the Minnesota Twins have been steadily devolving into a complete and total mess that no one much wants to be associated with.
By the trade deadline in 2025, we had players melting down on the field, requesting trades and taking shots on their way out the door. ("These facilities here, all the coaching staff, nutritionists, the kitchen — it's amazing what they have compared to what we had over at the Twins," said Chris Paddack shortly after being traded to Detroit.) Star Tribune columnist La Velle E. Neal III suggested that the Twins were almost doing Rocco Baldelli a favor by letting him go.
This is a wayward, rudderless franchise with unpopular ownership, questionable baseball leadership and meager fan interest. The most optimistic view is that the team will reinvest their Carlos Correa savings this offseason and push spending back to at least 2024-25 levels, potentially enabling the types of key additions to the bullpen and lineup required for a return to relevance.
Even if they have money to spend, though, the front office is going to find it difficult to recruit quality players who are in demand on the open market. Minnesota is just a blatantly unattractive destination at this point in time.
That same dynamic applies to their search for new coaching talent. We'll find out soon how many members of Rocco Baldelli's staff new manager Derek Shelton intends to keep around, if any, but presumably the Twins be looking to add at least a couple of new voices to the room. The bench coach role feels particularly important, potentially being staged as an heir-in-waiting behind the 55-year-old Shelton.
Will the best and brightest be drawn to this situation? Low expectations can be advantageous in some ways, but I just have a hard time seeing sought-after candidates gravitating toward this Twins team that is in such disarray.
The Shelton hiring itself feels like a bit of an ill omen. The Twins moved somewhat quickly to get their new skipper in place, ensuring they wouldn't get left standing in a game of musical chairs, but Shelton was hardly a hot commodity coming off a fairly disastrous run in Pittsburgh that led to his firing last May. If Minnesota didn't hire him, would anyone?
This is unfortunately a constraint that needs to be kept in mind as we plot out what's possible for the Twins this offseason. There are plenty of signals pointing to a continued teardown, but even in the scenario where they keep their veteran standouts and try to bring in some impact players, their work will be cut out for them.
With that in mind, the best hope for a turnaround lies in making good trades and getting more out of their current talent. The problem there is that Minnesota's only valuable trade assets (i.e. Joe Ryan and Pablo Lopez) are also pretty essential to any vision for competitiveness next year. And while fresh coaching voices under Shelton could be a positive, the rising stars in that field are also being heavily recruited as staffs across the league get rebuilt.
If they have any desire to rebound, recapture fan interest and get things started on the right foot under a reshaped ownership structure, Derek Falvey and Co. are going to need to get creative. Because they've put themselves in a place where they'll really to struggle in talent acquisition regardless of their resources
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