Twins’ New Pitching Plan May Revolutionize MLB Player Development

The idea of a 4-man rotation has some merit. That's one fewer starting pitcher you need to have on the depth chart. Workloads on starting pitchers have been drastically reduced compared to where we were in the 1980s when the 5-man rotation was created. Nobody is throwing 120-130 pitches in a game in 2025. If someone only throws 75-80 pitches, do they need 4 days to recover? Is it better to use a Game/OFF/Practice/OFF schedule?

The tricky part is you lose a starter but only gain one reliever back. Piggy-back of starters doesn't help - that trades a 5-man rotation for an 8-man rotation when the whole point is to maximize your top 4 pitchers. Even a 9-man bullpen is going to be gassed trying to cover 5 innings every night.

Some team is going to be brave and go back to a 4-man rotation but still try to get 90 pitches out of the starters.

IMO, so many things could go wrong with this approach, Number one and probably the most important is could this turn fans off, causing less viewership on TV and stadiums, Before I (and most of my friends that actually go to games) check the starting lineup to see if it worth the price of admission, I am not paying full price to see this approach.

Second, are agents going to push teams not to draft or try to force trades away from franchises using the approach, players and their agents always think highly of themselves (as they should) to be more than a bullpen type pitcher.

I can see teams doing this to pitchers in the minors that have proven they can't handle the load of a "real" starting pitcher or are often injured, but what about guys that are drafted high and paid handsomely, are they really going to limit there potential?

Lastly how is the union going to handle this, are they really going to just let teams slash earning potential of their members without a fight? 

and this in on top of things @chpettit19 mentioned above, but to his last point I don't see managers changing they way manager the last 2-4 innings, they are still going to use the guys at the end of the game they have the most trust with like they do now. 

With the current 13 man staff, we can all rank pitchers 1 - 13 (maybe not the exact same, but pretty close) and see how they are used, With this new way you are basically saying all pitchers are repetitively equal and interchangeable, and we know that isn't true. 

With that said I do like the idea of taking a little older guys with good stuff and seeing if there is a path to helping the major league team out and getting them to the majors. 

I've been all for this for a long time. I thought we were going to see some sort of this in '22 but was shut down quickly to the detriment to that rotation. It'll be very interesting to see how they incorporate this plan into the MLB level going forward. IMO it's revolutionary & could be very beneficial if they have the guts to go through with it. They are currently far from that plan on the MLB level.

Look! Twins once again setting the pace for Major League Baseball!! We’re undoubtedly the envy of every fan base.

 Innings/pitch counts down....spin rates jumping with corresponding rash of arm problems jumping something needs to be tried. 

Part im most curious about is the statement about recovery being quicker. I want to know the parameters they use in recovery and how they track that over the course of a season. I would need concrete data to get behind this. I hope they do cause like any fan a season can hinge on the health of starting pitching.

As soon as we had 3 rookies SP last year, I knew the season was lost...

This too shall pass.

How about preparing 5 good pitchers that can pitch 6-8 innings when they start? Novel idea for the local nine.

4 hours ago, Doc Lenz said:

How about preparing 5 good pitchers that can pitch 6-8 innings when they start? Novel idea for the local nine.

Are there even 5 guys like that in the entire league? Skenes and Skubal are leading the league in IP and they're about 6.4 innings per game.

Individual arms respond completely differently to pitching. Very few pitchers have what old timers called rubber arms, capable of throwing 20-30 pitches 3 out of every 5 days if needed. Michael Tonkin at his best approximates this player. Most relievers can go 10-20 pitches for 2-3 days but then need to be shut down fo acouple of days. . Some athletes never can transition to shorter periods between throwing. These guys can go up to 120+ pitches but need 3-4 days between starts. The 4 pitcher rotation was probably a fair system but when pitchers began to make big money management wanted to protect their investments. Turns out that 5 man rotations and max effort doesn't really keep the elbows and shoulders immune from injury even with the exaggerated pitch counts. So we see a continual dance and experimentation for what will work. It's complicated.

Player development (and evaluation) is a sore spot for the Twins.  Do something to improve this franchise of mediocrity 

AAA and AA have 28 man active rosters with no restrictions. They are both carrying 16 pitchers right now. This probably wouldn’t work unless there were changes made, but maybe this can be something that is explored with the CBA expiring.

Thanks @Cody Christie

I am very intrigued. I wrote about this Monday but it didn’t get much notice. Reposting here.

On this week’s episode of Inside Twins Drew MacPhail spoke about a pitching plan in the minors that looks to a scheduled four day rotation. They chose pitchers that were not in a starting rotation spot and are giving them a scheduled 4 day cadence in a quasi-starter role pitching 3-4 innings. Travis Adams game log in AAA fits this cadence. The claim is that they are getting more innings than some of their starters and they have seen the strikeout numbers tick up.

I went searching for these pitchers on this 4 day cadence other than Adams. Looking at the game logs the group in Wichita was the easiest to identify. Wichita has probably had less interruption in their schedule due to rain helping to keep the cadence at four days. The four quasi starters at Wichita have been John Klein, Mike Paredes, Justin Whorff and Pierson Ohl. There is evidence of others on the same schedule but Wichita had the most clear group.

The first claim was that they were matching or surpassing innings of the starters.

• Not quite. Klein and Paredes have near the same amount of innings as Baker and Rozek who are a 6 day starter schedule.

The second claim is that the numbers are improved. 

• Klein has improved in all areas. Strikeout rate is up from 20% to 28%. Walks have dropped 1%. His ERA,  xFIP and FIP are clearly better. Last year he threw 100 innings in a starter role. He is on pace to match or better that with his 44 this year.
• Paredes has gone the opposite direction with his strike out and walk rates. His ERA is better though at 2.49. He is on pace to significantly increase his innings pitched. He is already at 43. Last year he threw 65 innings in a relief role.
• Whorff was moved to AAA but spent most of this year in AA. In AA his strike out rate went from 24 to 30 and walk rates dropped from 9 to 5.5. His ERA, xFIP and FIP are all improved. He has 34.2 innings this year. Last year he had 71.
• Ohl started the season late due to injury and joined Wichita on April 25. His strike out rate has gone from 24 to 30 while his walk rate remains below 4%. ERA, xFIP and FIP are much improved over 2024. His innings (32.2) may not match last year’s (102) due to the later start. 

MacPhail said that the  hope is that pitchers will see improved success and be able to build back really well with this 4 day quasi-starter cadence. He ended with that maybe it something we will see in the major leagues with the Minnesota Twins.

So far the cadence for the starters in the minors has not changed. They pitch about every 6 days. I think we would see some changes with that starter cadence before we see it in the major leagues. What might that look like?

Do they use 8 pitchers in a 4 day cadence planning to get into the 7th or 8th before handing it off to the 5 man bullpen? Is it one group of 4 starters on that cadence with a 9 man pen? Can they afford to have the typical 5 man starting staff and 4 pitchers in the pen scheduled every 4th day leaving 4 unscheduled pitchers in the pen?

All teams need to be seeking ways to keep their pitchers healthy while improving their performance. I am glad the Twins are looking for ways to accomplish those goals with their minor league staffs.

1 hour ago, jorgenswest said:

The four quasi starters at Wichita have been John Klein, Mike Paredes, Justin Whorff and Pierson Ohl.

All 4 of those pitchers profile as relievers if they ever make the majors. This cadence gets them more innings than they would if they were strictly 1-inning relievers. Not a bad way to develop future bullpen arms.

Old enough to remember four man rotations from 1960's and early to mid 1970's.  Worked great then.  But of course the four starters were capable of throwing 260 to 300 plus innings in a season.  Most teams then also had a fill-in starter/long relief pitcher.  Jim Perry filled the role for the Twins in mid 1960's.  Twins are already down two starters this year and maybe three if Ober has an injury.  If they could find the arms to try it might not be a bad season to try it.  If they don't start beating the good teams soon it may not matter.

This sounds like a plan made for Louis Varland. 

This was actually my idea.  I wrote to the Twins manager and the pitching coach every year for 3 years saying the Twins should go to a 3-day rotation where every pitcher pitches about 60 pitches per start and you have two planned "starters" in each game, each pitching about 3 innings, and then the bullpen takes over the last 3 innings or so.  So you have basically a 6-man rotation.  Your best 6 pitchers will get more innings that way and be more effective.

When athletes train, they do not go all out every 5th day and then take 4 easy days.  They work out every other day or alternate hard days and easy days.  It should be the same with pitchers.  Pitch about 3 innings every third day or about two innings every other day.