Minnesota Twins 2025 preview
The Minnesota Twins are at a crossroads entering the 2025 season. The Pohlad family is looking for a buyer and years of being decent, but not good enough, have led to a total of one playoff series win since 2002 and it was in the best-of-three Wild Card Round in 2023. The Twins hadn’t even won a playoff game in 20 seasons before beating the Blue Jays 2-0 in a series where the teams combined to score six total runs.
The Twins did secure back-to-back winning, non-COVID seasons in 2023 and 2024 for the first time since 2009 and 2010, but still finished 10.5 games back of the Guardians and failed to sniff the postseason while three other AL Central teams made it. Despite nearly reaching two million fans for the first time since 2019, it has been a really quiet offseason and fans have to be discouraged that it sure seems like three other teams in the division have more promising outlooks.
Top MLB Resources:
But then you look at the betting odds and the Twins are still the favorites to take down the AL Central crown. Perception and reality may be at odds to some degree here, as the perception is that the Twins may have fallen behind the pack, but the reality, at least for oddsmakers and bettors, seems to be that this is the most projectable and safest team of the bunch.
I would say that Rocco Baldelli probably does open the season on the hot seat, though I’m not sure we’d see any executive or leadership changes until the ownership questions are answered. This is still an organization with three division championships in the last six years, and we’ll never know what the 2020 season would have had in store on the heels of going 101-61 in 2019.
The Twins did not retain any of their own free agents, signed three that are likely to make the MLB roster, and seem to be patiently waiting for some of their prospects to make the big leagues while being extremely cognizant of their spending. I’m not sure that’s a recipe for success.
2025 Minnesota Twins Odds
(odds from DraftKings as of Feb. 25)
World Series: +2500
AL Pennant: +1000
AL Central: +210
Win Total: 84.5 (-120/+100)
Make Playoffs: Yes +100 / No -120
Minnesota Twins Preview: Offense
There wasn’t a whole lot of flash to the Minnesota offense, but it was a solid unit. The Twins had the fewest stolen bases in the league with 65 and ranked 26th in FanGraphs’s all-encompassing BsR baserunning metric, but still wound up in the top 10 in fWAR among position players. When you consider that they also weren’t very good defensively, you start to respect what the offense did a bit more.
Minnesota finished ninth in wRC+ at 107 and 11th in wOBA at .316. Given that they really only got a little over half a season’s worth of plate appearances from Carlos Correa and Byron Buxton, things could definitely have gone better for them with more fortune on the health front. Correa was actually on track for a career year with 4.3 fWAR and a .385 wOBA with a 155 wRC+, but got limited to 86 games and 367 PA.
Buxton, who is hurt on an annual basis, had a .366 wOBA and a 142 wRC+ in 388 PA and 102 games. You can see why there is a glass half-full case for the Twins with those two guys, who were on track to be 7+ win players. There were only six total 7+ fWAR players last season among batting title qualifiers. The Twins could very well have had two of them if Correa and Buxton were able to sustain their paces.
But, you can’t talk about the Twins without talking about that possibility. Correa failed physicals that sent him back to Minnesota for a fraction of the money he was in line to make. He did play 136 and 135 games, respectively, in his two previous seasons with the Twins, but the foot injury concerns were always there. Buxton’s 102 games were the most he’s played since 2017. The same can be said for Royce Lewis, who was outstanding in 2023, but fell back in 2024 and still only played 82 games.
There is a world where all three stay healthy for a full season and the Twins reach their full potential. It may be Narnia, but that world seemingly could exist. And, by the way, it’s also worth pointing out that Correa is unlikely to replicate even that half season that he had after running a .343 BABIP and having some huge gaps between his actual stats and expected stats per Statcast (.310 BA, .278 xBA; .517 SLG, .455 xSLG; .385 wOBA, .358 xwOBA).
There are still a lot of above average hitters here. Not a ton of guys with ceilings outside of the aforementioned, but holdovers like Matt Wallner, Trevor Larnach, Jose Miranda, Edouard Julien all have varying upsides and high floors with decent contact quality and power. Carlos Santana will be a loss for a team that doesn’t draw a lot of walks, but this should still be an above average offense, even with the built-in health worries.
Minnesota Twins Preview: Pitching
This was the really disappointing part of the ballclub last season, but it wasn’t all their fault. Collectively, the Twins finished 21st in ERA at 4.26, but seventh in FIP at 3.84. There are a few guys that you can make cases for as bounce back candidates in 2025 just simply based on that ERA-FIP discrepancy.
Defense is part of the game, though, and the Twins were poor on defense. They were -20 in Defensive Runs Saved. Outs Above Average had them as a league-average defense, which I find really interesting. There are some big differences between the two grading systems, but this one is notable because of that huge ERA-FIP gap.
What really created the big ERA-FIP gap is that the Twins were awful at stranding runners in high-leverage situations. Opposing offenses batted .272 (27th) with a league-worst .322 BABIP against. When you also consider that the Twins had the second-highest infield fly ball rate in that split, the BABIP is even more of a surprise. Pop ups are basically strikeouts on balls in play, so the Twins actually did well to induce those and limit the damage as much as they could.
Minnesota only needed 10 different starters and Pablo Lopez made 32 starts, while Bailey Ober made 31. So it wasn’t a terrible season on the health front. Lopez had a 4.08 ERA with a 3.67 xERA and a 3.65 FIP, so he’s a bit of a bounce back guy. Ober had a 3.98 ERA with a 3.22 xERA and a 3.82 FIP. Those two should be fixtures at the top of the rotation all year alongside Joe Ryan, who really cut back his home run issue and had a 3.60 ERA with a 3.44 FIP. He had a 2.87 xERA because of his sterling K/BB ratio, but the home run issue is always going to hurt him in the ERA department.
What the Twins have to figure out, aside from keeping Ryan healthier, is what they can maximize with Simeon Woods Richardson, Chris Paddack, Louie Varland, Zebby Matthews, David Festa, and the others in line for starts. They have a ton of options and if one can pop, not only would he serve as some injury insurance, but would also elevate the ceiling of the rotation and the team as a whole.
My votes would be on Festa and Matthews. Woods Richardson made 28 starts over 133.2 innings last season with a respectable 4.17 ERA and a 4.12 FIP. There isn’t much swing and miss upside there and the Twins need that with their defensive concerns. Paddack doesn’t have enough arsenal depth, plus he has a questionable health history. Festa has much bigger strikeout upside and Matthews does, too, but he has to keep the ball in the park.
They’re all flawed in some way and any Lopez or Ober injury puts this rotation in a major state of flux. I’m just assuming Ryan misses at least a few starts. I don’t think the other parts of this team are good enough for any of the four main areas – offense, starting pitching, relief pitching, defense – to slack off greatly.
Regarding the bullpen, Griffin Jax and Jhoan Duran are great. The middle relief is less great and I’m surprised that the Twins didn’t invest in this area. Maybe they think one of the starters can transition into a relief role, a la division rival Cleveland with Hunter Gaddis.
Minnesota Twins Player to Watch
OF Matt Wallner
Wallner profiles as a very productive bat on the fat side of the platoon. He only had 44 PA against lefties and hit .184, but he batted .275/.387/.566 with a 171 wRC+ and a .407 wOBA against righties in 217 PA. Among guys with 200 PA against RHP, only Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani, Kyle Tucker, Juan Soto, Bobby Witt Jr., and Kerry Carpenter had a higher wRC+ in that split.
Wallner also had a 34.1% K% in that split, almost 10% higher than any of the guys above him. Making contact is his problem, but he’s got elite bat speed, great barrel skills, and a lot of contact authority to the pull side. He’s not a total defensive liability given that he’ll be in line to play roughly 75% of the games if he stays healthy. He should be a really nice piece for the Twins, who are a station-to-station ballclub reliant on the long ball to maximize their offensive ability.
Minnesota Twins Season Win Total Odds & Prediction
Correa says he’s fine, but will be doing daily treatment on his foot and the plantar fasciitis issue that could pop up at any time. Buxton is a lock to get hurt at some point. So is Lewis. So is Ryan. It will be a lot for the Twins to overcome, though reinforcements are coming from below in Emmanuel Rodriguez, FanGraphs 20th-ranked prospect, and Luke Keaschall, the 56th-ranked prospect. We’re probably a couple years away from seeing Walker Jenkins.
Nevertheless, the Twins and their injury woes, a pedestrian bullpen, an uncomfortable ownership situation, and a manager whose pants are starting to burn are hard to buy in with for the upcoming season. I think the talent is there and they could very well win a wide-open AL Central Division. I do not think that they will and I think they have a better chance of going Under 84.5 than going Over it. It isn’t a bet just yet for me, but could be by the time the last week of Spring Training gets here.
Stronger Lean: Under 84.5
