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I’m just going to cut to the chase: Justin Morneau in 2009. That’s the last time that a Twins’ primary first baseman has been a scary dude in the middle of a lineup. Seriously.
Technically, Morneau was also a lethal bat in 2010, but because of the midseason concussion that cut short a potential MVP campaign and altered the course of his career, Michael Cuddyer technically logged more appearances at first base than Morneau did that year, and a 15-year drought sounds more significant than a measly 14-year drought.
But whether you prefer to be technically right or technically wrong doesn’t matter; the first base situation does. First base is a place you can put nearly anyone—in theory. It’s the lowest position in the field on the defensive spectrum, meaning that the value of having a good defender there is lessened. You can get away with putting some schlub there that you wouldn’t dream about sticking in center field or at shortstop--or, to put it another way, you can take just about anyone who can play a passable center field, or third base, or catcher, and they're likely to be ok with the glove at first.
As such, first base has historically been seen as a home for big bats. It’s a position that features players around whom a team builds their lineup. Since 2010, the average first baseman has been about 5 to 20% better than an average hitter, with very few years in which the position as a whole is less than 10% better than average. But for the Twins, it’s been closer to just another bat.
The Twins have not been among the top 10 in MLB in first baseman OPS+ since a combination of an injury-riddled Morneau, Cuddyer, Luke Hughes, Chris Parmalee, Joe Mauer, and Trevor Plouffe ranked 10th in 2011. A Carlos Santana-led 2024 group (José Miranda and Alex Kirilloff both had a dozen appearances) nearly cracked the list, ranking 11th.
But alas, Santana’s time as a Twin is likely over, and it would be difficult to count on a man in his age-39 season to match his age-38 production, even though his numbers weren’t eye-popping themselves. Santana was about 10 to 15% better than league-average as a hitter last season, and in a down year for first basemen (their lowest wRC+ as a group in decades: 107), that’s enough to almost propel the group into the top 10, but it’s still right around average for the position historically.
Prior to Santana, the Twins spent a couple of years with a revolving door at first base. In 2023, Donovan Solano—a utility infielder—got a very slight majority of the time at first base, appearing in just over half of the team’s games (85). He was also about 10-15% better than an average hitter, which was average among first basemen that year. Kirilloff had a slightly better offensive year than Solano, but he was held to just 88 total games by injury, splitting his appearances between first base and the outfield. Joey Gallo also saw time there early in the season (when he was swinging the bat well), raising their level of production but not cracking the top 10.
In 2022, Miranda played a plurality of games at first base (77 appearances), followed by Luis Arraez (65 appearances), and a dozen or so games from Miguel Sanó and Kirilloff. Despite good years from Miranda and Arraez, the group barely made it into the top 20 among the league’s first-base groups.
Sanó was the primary first baseman in 2021 and 2020, and he clubbed 43 home runs in 170 games during that stretch (which included the 2020 shortened season), but he did little else, grading out as, at best, a league-average first baseman during that time—more of a sixth or seventh hitter in the order than a third or fourth—and the rest of the plate appearances went to a mediocre Kirilloff and Willains Astudillo performing like his post-2018 self.
In 2019, everyone was hitting the ball across the league. Relative to the league, first-base production was a bit down, mostly because everyone was up. CJ Cron manned the position admirably until a thumb injury that substantially hampered his performance, as he had an .814 OPS before the injury and a .702 mark after it. In his absence, utility players Marwin González, Ehire Adrianza, and Astudillo got the lion’s share of the work, and they hit like utility players.
Prior to those years, Mauer and Morneau held down the position. Both were (seemingly) held back by the brain trauma that they suffered in the earlier part of the decade. We don’t need to go back that far, but it ties the story together. This has been an ongoing problem.
And looking forward, it’s unclear how exactly it’s fixed. The Twins are in a great position right now, with players like Byron Buxton and Carlos Correa providing good offense while playing defense-first spots and other players that the organization hopes can be relied on for offense, but they don’t have a full-time first baseman right now.
On the current depth chart, infielders Miranda and Edouard Julien seem to be the heirs apparent. They are suboptimal defenders at third and second base, respectively, and show flashes of having plus bats that can rank among the top 10 first basemen in the league. However, both have been inconsistent early in their careers.
Corner outfielders Matt Wallner and Trevor Larnach turned in good 2024 campaigns, and with the likes of top outfield prospect Emmanuel Rodriguez knocking on the door to the majors, it would be sensible to convert one of the two to first base, but the team has previously shown no interest. The former first baseman of the future, the oft-injured Kirilloff, has been inconsistent offensively and a poor defender, which has led to him being labeled a non-tender candidate this offseason.
Right now, the position—the spot where offense should come the easiest—is in flux for the third straight offseason, with no clear internal fix and a seemingly limited payroll. Hypothetically, it should be an easy problem to fix, but the Twins have shown themselves incapable of finding a middle-of-the-order first-base bat for a decade now. Sometimes that can be offset by defense, like Santana in 2024 or Mauer in 2017, but for a team that has struggled to produce consistent offense in recent years, finding that big bat could be more vital than ever.
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