Twins "Engaged" with Ryan Jeffers, Promote 3 Staffers to New Roles

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The Twins remain engaged with free-agent catcher Ryan Jeffers and have discussed other terms under which he might return, even as he ponders the qualifying offer the team extended to him earlier this month, general manager Jeremy Zoll told reporters Monday afternoon in Las Vegas. Teams have congregated at the Aria Resort this week for the annual GM Meetings, which has traditionally been a staging area for the offseason's bigger moves.

"Ryan earned the right to become a free agent, explore the market, and I want to give him that respect," Zoll said. "[He's trying] to understand what is out there, but also, we're in touch there. We have made clear that we'd love to have him back, not just in a QO scenario, but in other scenarios, too."

Zoll said the team doesn't feel the need to wait until Nov. 17 (when Jeffers must decide whether or not to accept the qualifying offer) to have those conversations with Jeffers. In theory, they could draw a hard line during that period, forcing Jeffers to either accept or decline the one-year offer on the table before talking about multi-year options. Instead, they've left the door wide-open for the backstop to return, should he choose to do so.

At the same time, Zoll has to turn his attention to the wider world of the hot stove, which is just beginning to catch a light and isn't yet crackling the way most executives believe it will by the end of this month.

"Not yet," Zoll said, when asked whether the early days of the offseason have felt tangibly different from past Novembers. "I don’t know. Maybe I’ll have a better answer for you by the end of the week, but right now, I’d say it feels closer to normal than not from a general operations perspective."

That means that the Twins are laying groundwork through conversations with both representatives for free agents and other clubs, and that there are no clear roadblocks in the team's vision to making a particular move. So far, the urgency required to prompt those deals to happen just hasn't been there. The league is expected to lock out the players at the beginning of December, and Zoll acknowledged that "deadlines spur action," so a flurry of activity is still likely at the end of this month, but teams' conversations haven't yet been tinged heavily by the specter of that work stoppage.

Jonas Lovin Joins Big-League Coaching Staff, Amid Other Promotions

Zoll also announced Monday that Jonas Lovin would be promoted to serve as the major-league assistant pitching coach, after the team interviewed several candidates and ultimately decided to elevate the long-time organization functionary. Lovin most recently served as the assistant minor-league pitching coordinator. In his new gig, he'll work with new head pitching coach Brian Reith and incumbent bullpen coach LaTroy Hawkins.

"Our hitting group this year did a really good job working as a team, and it felt like they could all kind of fill in for—you know, one person might float over here, the other person could fill in," Zoll said, when asked whether the goal of shaking up the pitching coaching group was an attempt to mirror their success on the hitting side. "Some players worked with just [Keith Beauregard] or just Trevor [Amicone], or Rayden [Sierra], and then some worked with all of them, and there wasn't as clear of a delineation on, ‘This person is only doing this set of responsibilities, and this person's only doing that set of responsibilities.’"

While the team didn't elevate Reith to a director of pitching or similar higher role, the hope is that the communication between the former big-league righthanders Reith and Hawkins will be a bit more comprehensive than between Hawkins and the ousted Pete Maki.

"You still need to create some level of roles there, but I think with the group we have for this year, we're hopeful that it creates a little bit of a more well-rounded nature and a little bit less redundancy in skill set and expertise," Zoll said.

The team is also promoting Ross Seaton, who was already a member of their advance scouting group, to be the head of that department; he'll also have a role in working with the pitching coaches and pitchers in game preparation.

Hailey Leviton, who had been an assistant director of baseball operations, also got a promotion. Leviton will now serve as the director of major-league operations, which Zoll characterized as an effort to have her "take on a more clear lead function." Leviton has had a wide remit within the team's front-office structure, but gained greater control of specific functions via this promotion.