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Last season, Pablo López took a step backward, Joe Ryan missed the last two months, Chris Paddack missed the whole second half, and a bunch of rookies were thrown into the fire for a team attempting to contend. Through all of this, plus Sonny Gray exiting via free agency, Twins starters still finished with a top-five FIP in the American League, and they had the highest strikeout rate.
Here in 2025, they Twins are bringing back the whole gang, including a (hopefully) healthy Ryan and Paddack. Meanwhile, talented young hurlers will look to gain traction in the majors after getting their first taste, while prospects continue to progress toward big-league debuts.
It's an exciting time for the Twins rotation. Let's break it down.
TWINS STARTING PITCHERS AT A GLANCE
Rotation: Pablo López, Joe Ryan, Bailey Ober, Chris Paddack, Simeon Woods Richardson
Depth: David Festa, Zebby Matthews, Travis Adams, Randy Dobnak
Prospects: Andrew Morris, Marco Raya, Charlee Soto, Cory Lewis, C.J. Culpepper
Twins fWAR Ranking Last Year: 9th out of 30
Twins fWAR Projection This Year: 7th out of 30
THE GOOD
Between López, Ryan and Bailey Ober, the Twins are heading into the season with a trio of legitimate frontline starters who could be counted on to pitch in a playoff scenario. It wouldn't be surprising if any of them were All-Stars. There aren't many teams around the league that can go three-deep in the rotation with this kind of quality and proven performance.
It all starts with Pablo at the top. Preparing for his third consecutive Opening Day appearance, López has starred during his time in a Twins uniform, ranking ninth among MLB starters in fWAR since the start of 2023 with a pair of masterful postseason gems under his belt. López's results were down a bit last year but the stuff and underlying metrics were outstanding. He's locked in as a No. 1 starter, although it remains to be seen whether he get back on his previous track toward true "ace" billing.
Ober was consistently excellent last year, blossoming into the pitcher we all hoped he could become. While a few major clunkers scuffed up his overall numbers a bit, the big right-hander was usually very effective on the mound, posting an identical 3.60 ERA and FIP in 30 starts following his season-opening blow-up in Kansas City.
Ryan was even better than Ober, and arguably the Twins' best pitcher when his season was cut short by a shoulder strain suffered in early August. At that time he was cruising along, with a 3.60 ERA of his own through 135 innings. His exceptional control helped Ryan hold opponents to a .257 on-base percentage, and his 3.1 fWAR ranked among the top 35 MLB starters even though he missed almost one-third of the season.
Health for pitchers is always precarious, but these three give ample reason for confidence on the durability front. López and Ober have not missed a start over the past two years, putting previous injury woes behind them. Ryan is coming off a season-ending teres major strain, but had a clear record of health before that, and appears to be fully recovered. He has nine strikeouts and two walks in 4 ⅔ innings this spring.
The team's fourth veteran starter, Chris Paddack, is much more of a question mark from a health standpoint. He's been limited to 115 innings across three seasons with the Twins due to elbow issues that required surgery in 2022 and flared up again last year. He does have good stuff and considerable upside when he's able to pitch, but the team can hardly count on him being available for even a majority of the season.
Which is okay because they've got a robust stable of young arms who are either ready or almost ready to enter the fold. Several have already gotten their feet wet in the big leagues. That includes fifth starter Simeon Woods Richardson, who accrued significant experience by making 28 starts with the Twins last year.
His experience gave him an edge over David Festa and Zebby Matthews, both of whom were optioned to Triple-A on Sunday but made their impressions in major-league camp. Matthews in particular has drawn rave reviews for the improvement he's already showing over last year, when he was the biggest breakout player in the Twins system.
Festa and Matthews will lead a loaded St. Paul rotation that also figures to include Andrew Morris, Cory Lewis and Travis Adams, giving Minnesota an enviable level of high-level minor-league talent to draw from when needed. Further down the line, prospect Charlee Soto is the one to watch – a sturdily built 19-year-old with upper-90s velocity and a stellar changeup. He's got the makings of a front-of-rotation workhorse.
THE BAD
Young starters may find themselves put to the test for the Twins this year, and that's always a risky proposition. We saw this play out in the late stage of 2024 after Ryan went down. The dependability of the rotation was greatly diminished as Woods Richardson posted a 5.23 second-half ERA, Matthews took his lumps, and starters generally struggled to get through five innings on a regular basis, increasing the bullpen's burden.
If the Twins are forced to go without, say, Paddack and one member of their rotation-fronting trio, we'll see some relatively untested arms thrown into the fire. That's not necessarily a bad thing, because as mentioned above, there's much to like about the young stable of starting pitchers. But again, there's risk.
I think this unit has a relatively high floor, barring a massive wave of injuries, so really the big question is how high their ceiling is. The Twins have a good rotation – can it be great? That really depends on their veterans staying mostly healthy and finding ways to elevate. Can López lock in some consistency and assert himself as a true standout No. 1, or will he again post an ERA in the 4 range? Can Ryan and Ober replicate or improve on their 2024 campaigns? Will Paddack finally be able to tap into the upside that is continually associated with him? Is the Derek Falvey pipeline ready to deliver?
These questions will determine the true quality of the Twins starting pitching corps, which could just as easily be elite as pretty good.
THE BOTTOM LINE
This has the potential to be a top-three rotation in all of baseball, but that'll require good health and some breakthroughs from the younger crop of MLB-ready arms. If things click the way the Twins are hoping, with their quality depth setting up a dependable starter to take the mound for nearly every game, they're going to be a tough team to beat. You just don't find that many teams with actually good pitchers in the back of their rotation and the Twins are arguably about eight-deep in that regard right now.
Share your thoughts on the outlook at starting pitcher below and check out the rest of our Position Analysis Series:
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: Catcher
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: First Base
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: Second Base
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: Third Base
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: Shortstop
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: Left Field
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: Center Field
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: Right Field
- Twins 2025 Position Analysis: Designated Hitter
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