Twins Video
The MLB offseason is here, and teams have until 4 PM Central time on Monday to extend qualifying offers to eligible free agents. That's also when the exclusive negotiating window between players and their previous teams expires, opening free agency in full. For the Twins, that means that they need to decide whether to issue that offer to catcher Ryan Jeffers. If he were to accept it, he would receive $23.15 million on a one-year deal. If he declined, the Twins would receive a 2027 draft pick if and when he signs with another team.
Jeffers, 29, batted .256/.353/.461 in his walk year, with 14 home runs, 46 walks and 66 strikeouts in 369 plate appearances. It was the second-best offensive season of his career, trailing only 2023, and most fans expect the Twins to make at least a nominal effort to retain him by extending the QO on the back of that strong performance.
That might well happen. However, there are a few things pushing against the simple logic of his good performance, as the team weighs its options with regard to what would be a major investment.
Jeffers's Doubtful Durability and the Twins' Payroll Utility
As the offseason begins, one still-unanswered question is how much the team is willing to back up owner Tom Pohlad's big talk about spending more on payroll than they have over the last two seasons. Based on their end-of-season press conference, the team wants fans to expect significant outlays and a boost to somewhere north of $135 million in spending in 2027. A pessimist might point out, though, that they have every reason to raise expectations that way in October and November. Many ticket sales for the following season (especially season-ticket and group sales, which are teams' major revenue drivers) happen during that early phase of the offseason, so setting high expectations can be helpful even if you're unable (or unwilling) to deliver on them.
Presumably, the team has at least some good-faith intention to spend this winter, but they also have plenty of money spoken for already, and that needs to inform their decisions this winter. Pablo López is due $21.5 million in 2027, and while there's optimism (at the moment) that he'll be ready for Opening Day, the reality of recent cases in which pitchers underwent second Tommy John surgeries is that most aren't back on the mound and up to speed until 16 or 17 months after their operation. Justin Steele had surgery in April 2025 and didn't pitch at all in the majors in 2026. Jordan Montgomery had it shortly before Steele and only made it back to the bigs the following August. López had his operation in February, so barring a significant setback, he should be on the mound before the end of June, but that's different than giving the team a full complement of front-of-the-rotation innings.
López's case is similar to that of Byron Buxton, who faces a long recovery from surgery on the labrum in his hip. The team hopes he'll be back for Opening Day; the smart money says he won't be. Buxton's base salary for 2027, as with the other years of his contract, is $15 million. The club is also sending $10 million to the Astros again next year, to defray the costs of the Carlos Correa contract they dumped at the 2025 trade deadline. That's nearly $50 million that the team will spend next year on players who either won't play for them or can't be counted upon for a full season's work. A good over/under for batters faced by López is 600. A good one for Buxton's plate appearances is 400. That's not much volume in return for what looks likely to be a third of their payroll.
Paying Jeffers another $23 million and change would risk exacerbating that problem. Though he did cobble together 465 plate appearances in 2024 and 464 in 2025, he's never been a durable, high-volume player. Over the last five seasons, there have been 79 player-seasons in which a catcher caught at least 800 innings for their team. Jeffers has never reached that milestone. It's possible that changes next year. Carson Kelly, for instance, had never gotten to 800 innings in a season before joining the Cubs two years ago, and caught more than 860 in each of the last two years, in his early 30s. It's never wise to bet on a catcher becoming suddenly more durable as they cross into their 30s.
Can the Twins afford to pay QO-level money for a player who is unlikely to qualify for the batting title? When he's on the field, Jeffers is generally good, but he's not a plus defensive catcher, and if were a semi-regular designated hitter, he wouldn't be an especially impressive one. It might be that the money they're already spending on players who can't stay on the field makes it impossible to justify doing more of the same.
The Twins' Approach to Keeping Catchers Fresh
Of course, one thing that held down Jeffers's playing time totals during his Twins tenure was outside his control. In the last two seasons of Rocco Baldelli's tenure, the team used the most careful alternating pattern of catcher starts in the history of the sport. Jeffers would start one day; Christian Vázquez would start the next. That worked nicely, too. It exposed the weakness of Vázquez's bat, but it also protected each backstop from overuse and reduced their risk of injury. Neither has otherwise ever been as healthy or as consistent as they were under that playing-time arrangement. That setup allowed Jeffers to get the playing time he did at DH, too. It was part of why the team spent a significant amount on their second catcher again last winter, replacing Vázquez with Victor Caratini. They believe in playing-time parity at catcher, as much as the roster allows, so they try to have a stronger-than-average second option at the position.
The natural extension of that mindset, though, is that you don't pay market rates for your first catcher, because other teams will price that player in a way very different from you. They're thinking of using them for 25 more games behind the plate than you are. They're planning on giving them at least 50 more plate appearances than you are. In this case, that means (simply) that paying $23 million for a first catcher is incompatible with the team's approach to the position.
That approach isn't set in stone. Derek Shelton, unlike Baldelli, is a former catcher, and he was much more willing to let his backstops play several days in a row in 2026. Then again, that got them into some trouble, in multiple ways, so the organization might try to nudge him back toward their preferred style in 2027.
One argument here would be to extend the QO, knowing other teams might see Jeffers as a more important and high-volume piece than the Twins do, and then let him walk away. The risk that Jeffers might accept the offer is not minimal, though. Even fellow Scott Boras client Nick Martinez accepted one for 2025. The Twins can't give a QO unless they're willing to actually pony up that money for Jeffers. Besides, the rest of the league might like to play Jeffers more, but they're unlikely to be keen on giving up a draft pick to do it.
Players with durability or role-size questions are exactly the types who often get stranded on the market if they have a QO attached to them. That's why similar hitters to Jeffers, like Trent Grisham and Gleyber Torres, each took the QO last fall. Kelly, the aforementioned comp to Jeffers as a late-blooming catcher, signed with the Cubs for just $11 million over two years, and had no draft compensation encumbrance. The market might dry up as soon as Jeffers is tagged with that offer, so again, the Twins have to anticipate that he might accept it, and plan their choice about whether to give it accordingly.
Losing Jeffers for nothing would hurt. It's why he was viewed as a trade candidate right up to the deadline in August, despite the Twins assuming a buying posture. However, the Twins can't extend the QO just because the alternative is painful. They have to view the offer as the right choice, weighing the upside and risks of each option. That might lead them to what would be a very unpopular choice. They can't worry about that. They have to make the right one.
Do you approve of the job the Twins front office is doing?
Follow Twins Daily For Minnesota Twins News & Analysis
- Blyleven2011, nclahammer, Twinsgypsy and 3 others
-
5
-
1
Recommended Comments
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now