It's Time to Get Proactive With These Three Young Twins Pitchers

The Twins are coming off a season in which their bullpen played a big part in a historic collapse. That bullpen has plenty of remaining question marks, including whether the team could part with a foundational member to improve the overall roster. With such a small needle to thread, the Twins may have to be more aggressive in transitioning young arms to the bullpen.

That leaves the club in an interesting spot this offseason. The relief corps does not need a complete teardown, because even as-is, they're a talented unit headed into 2025. They could still use some help, though, and even if this front office valued relief pitchers at a high level (they do not), the payroll situation would prevent any significant additions. Financial restrictions could even result in a big name being traded away from this group.

The bullpen will likely include many of the names from last season. While this group carries plenty of talent, we saw it completely implode as the worst-case scenarios played out repeatedly. We know there likely isn’t any external help coming, but the Twins should look to fortify their bullpen depth from within in 2025. Three standout candidates could do just that.

Louie Varland
The Twins kept Varland in the St. Paul rotation even while multiple other pitchers were ahead of him on the MLB depth chart, and the MLB bullpen struggled. In 2025, he should be a member of the Twins bullpen from day one. After multiple years of struggling as a starting pitcher, it’s time that the Twins let his plus raw stuff play up in a role where his mistake pitches are at least thrown with 100% effort.

Varland’s tendency to leave balls over the plate could still be a problem in the bullpen, but the frequency at which he did so in the rotation led to too many untenable outings. We’ve seen his dominance for the short stretches the Twins have allowed him to be a traditional reliever. It’s time we see if Varland can be a high-end relief pitcher in 2025.

Matt Canterino
Injury struggles have overshadowed Matt Canterino’s complete dominance in his professional baseball career. He’s struck out over one-third of the opposing hitters he’s faced and posted a sub-2.00 ERA across all levels of the minor leagues, but this has been through just over 80 innings across three seasons. His health is currently in flux following a shoulder injury that ended his 2024 campaign, but as long as he’s in the organization, he’s a potential factor for the Twins because of his talent.

The Twins have tried to bring Canterino back from multiple serious injuries as a starter, and it’s gone poorly every time. It’s possible that the 6-foot-2 right-hander’s arm would give him trouble regardless of his role, but it’s pretty clear at this point that asking him to throw multiple innings has not been successful. At 26 years old and already on the 40-man roster, Canterino is out of time to build up to a starter’s workload, and every inning thrown in the minor leagues seems like a waste. If he’s healthy in 2025, the Twins should fast-track him to the big-league bullpen and hope that a change in role can keep him on the field.

Connor Prielipp
Prielipp’s story is similar to Canterino’s, in that both have the raw potential that makes it difficult for the Twins to give up on them as starters. However, the injuries are becoming too much to stick to the plan. Prielipp has dominated whenever he’s been on the mound in recent years, but those occasions have been far too rare. In 2024, he threw just over 23 innings and was dominant from the left side.

Prielipp should still be handled carefully, but one could argue it shouldn’t be as a starting pitcher. Drafted in the 2nd round of the 2022 draft, Prielipp has the kind of raw stuff to make the jump to MLB at some point in 2025, despite not having reached Double-A. While not as old as Canterino, Prielipp’s raw stuff is so compelling that it’s easy to dream of him dominating big-league hitters right now, rather than spending several years hoping he can build up a starter’s workload while using up bullets against minor-league hitters. It’s something the Twins have to at least consider in 2025.

The Twins have rarely made significant external additions to the bullpen under Derek Falvey, and when they have, they’ve typically gone very poorly. Given the financial constraints this winter, it may be time to change how they handle some young pitching in their system. While the value comparison between a starting pitcher and a reliever is obvious, the Twins should be taking steps to ensure a 2024 bullpen meltdown doesn’t happen again in 2025.