One of Major League Baseball’s best pitching units led the Minnesota Twins last year. Minnesota’s pitchers were fifth-best in baseball with a 3.87 team ERA and were best in the league with a 25.9 percent strikeout percentage from the staff. Typically, a team with that kind of pitching wins 90 games. Instead, the Twins finished the season with 87 wins largely because their lineup didn’t consistently pull its weight.
Last year, Minnesota’s hitters led the league with a 26.6 percent strikeout clip. Runners who reached base had a tough time coming around to score, even when they were in scoring position. First, they didn’t get many opportunities with 1,549 plate appearances with RISP, 20th-best in baseball. That led to just 322 hits with RISP, 22nd in the league. Strikeouts absolutely killed rallies all season long. Minnesota had 389 strikeouts with RISP, the second-worst this year.
But Minnesota’s hitting got much better in the second half of the season. A .809 team OPS, third-best in baseball, since the All-Star break turned around their season-long hitting numbers. As a team, the lineup posted a 109 OPS+ (sixth best in baseball), .753 OPS (seventh best), and hit the ball with an 89.4 MPH average exit velocity (tied for fifth) in 2023. As a result, the Twins led the American League with 233 home runs this season. Despite the low attempts and hits, the Twins still had the sixth-best .811 OPS with RISP, and their 60 home runs with RISP were third-best in baseball.
Minnesota’s 4.74 runs per game was 11th best in baseball. However, they didn’t produce runs consistently, and blowout wins boosted their run average. Anecdotally, it felt like the Twins could score 10-plus runs one night, followed by multiple-game stretches where the offense could barely muster more than two runs. Even in-game, Minnesota hitters would go down in order during multiple innings mid-game, no matter how well they were hitting in the early innings.
The Twins lineup was extremely high ceiling, low floor throughout the season. A slightly more consistent offense can push Minnesota into the tier of teams that consistently make deep playoff runs. That sounds simple. But to fix them, there needs to be an assessment of why these issues occurred last year.
Strikeouts aren’t an optimal result, but they can be a necessary evil. The Twins were one of baseball’s best offenses in the second half, but they still struck out often. It goes to show that strikeouts can be a burden, but not a massive one if other parts of the offense are working. However, Minnesota has to reduce the amount rally-killing strikeouts they had.
Just strike out less is too vague and won’t fix the issue. Contact for the sake of contact would be swinging the pendulum too far in the other direction. The answer is somewhere in the middle. The Twins need to do a better job of hitting certain offspeed pitches, specifically curveballs. Minnesota’s hitters were one of the worst teams in the league against the curve. According to Statcast, hitters posted a 28th-best minus-14.0 runs above average clip against the bender.
Ironically, Joey Gallo had the most success against curveballs with a plus-4-run value despite a 40 percent whiff rate against the pitch this season. Only five Twins players had a positive run value rank against curveballs. Kyle Farmer and Jorge Polanco were at minus-3 run value. Christian Vazquez was the worst with a minus-5 run value when pitchers threw him a curveball.
Despite Minnesota’s strikeout struggles, opponents had to respect their power. The Twins had to be selective in finding their pitch, because opponents threw 49.4 percent of pitches in the zone, the lowest percentage in baseball. Minnesota’s batters were around league average in swinging outside of the strike zone. Still, recognizing pitches and taking advantage of balls in the zone was an issue for the Twins. Their 83.1 percent zone contact rate was second to last in baseball last year.
So what do all of these numbers mean? Well, it might mean the Twins were too passive at the plate. Being patient and waiting for a good pitch to hit is by no means a bad philosophy. However, it can lead to a situation where hitters consistently put themselves into bad positions when pitchers are locating their spots or when they can’t recognize pitches. It’s why the strikeout numbers are as high as they are.
Last year, Minnesota’s batters swung at the first pitch in just 1,851 at-bats, producing a .746 OPS. Compare that to the 3,638 at-bats where they took the first pitch and had a .755 OPS. Even with the higher number of at-bats, the Twins still struck more than double the amount of times with a 1-0 count compared to a 0-1 count. They had a 1.105 OPS when they did put the ball in play on the first pitch. Working pitch counts and not being too aggressive is important, but Minnesota’s hitters can’t be overly passive next year.
Perhaps the Twins just need to give it time. The lineup started cold last year and gradually improved. Minnesota got a lot of its offensive production from Matt Wallner, Edouard Julien, and Royce Lewis, rookies who got more chances in the second half of the season.
However, Minnesota’s flaws returned in the playoffs. The Twins posted a 33.6 percent strikeout rate while going 5 for 38 with RISP in the postseason. They need to pay some attention to these issues in the offseason.
The Twins can’t win if they can’t score. They also can’t consistently score if they can’t produce in high-leverage situations. They also have to be able to hit curveballs. Hitters have to produce with runners in scoring position and consistently recognize pitches, which is easier said than done. By doing so, Minnesota can vault itself into the next tier of postseason competitors.
