The Twins have been hit hard by injuries this spring but dodged their latest bullet, it seems. The team announced that third player Royce Lewis‘ A recent MRI came back clean. Per Bobby Nightengale of the Minnesota Star Tribune, Lewis will be out today after suffering a strain on his right side while running the bases yesterday but is expected to return to normal practice this weekend.
Lewis, 27 in June, looks like he’s going to hit the ground running in 2023. The former No. 1 overall pick came back from a torn ACL to hit .309/.372/.548 with 15 homers in just 239 plate appearances. The Twins won the AL Central that year, thanks in no small part to that production coming from a long senior season, and Lewis exploded for four home runs in just 26 plate appearances that postseason, helping the Twins get past the Blue Jays in the Wild Card round before falling to the Astros in four games during the ALDS.
Injuries continued to set Lewis back. In addition to an ACL tear in the same right knee, he had a major league oblique strain, quad strain (twice), adductor strain and hamstring strain (twice). Since showing that true brilliance in ’23, he’s taken 728 turns at the plate over two seasons and posted a pedestrian .235/.288/.416 batting line while bouncing between the active roster and the injured list due to a slew of lower-body injuries.
Getting Lewis back to 2023 form — or at least something within his reach — will be crucial for the Twins in 2026. Ownership and the front office continue to broadcast a desire to compete this season, but the Twins dismantled the bullpen in last summer’s deadline, and lost. Pablo López from UCL surgery already this spring, and made only minor additions to the roster over the winter.
Of course, it’s still possible that other additions could be on the horizon. There are a number of lovely bull arms still on the market (eg Danny Coulombe, Michael Kopech, Justin Wilson) over the two most prominent starters in free agency this winter: Lucas Giolito again Zack Littell. Since López is missing for the season he is fine David Festa shut down due to shoulder issues, one would think the Twins would bring in a good landing spot for an unsigned starter, whether Giolito, Littell, Tyler Anderson or Patrick Corbin – if only to give the club more innings amid growing injury concerns.
“We’re hoping to stay healthy all the way through but we’re going to look at all options from an outside perspective and some options internally,” general manager Jeremy Zoll said yesterday (link via MLB.com’s Matthew Leach). “…We want to figure out how we can do everything we can to supplement that [internal] a group that is still very popular. We’re seeing a lot up there and we’re going to use the spring to see what’s going on everywhere. You often see a lull in the action for a while as teams settle in, wanting to make sure they stay healthy. We will continue to explore.”
The twins have it Joe Ryan, Bailey Ober and without options is fine Simeon Woods Richardson more or less locked into the first three rotation positions. Rights Hello Bradley, Zebby Matthews again Mick Abel they are competing for the last two spots on the staff, and the top tiers of their farm systems include similar prospects Connor Prielipp, Kendry Rojas again Andrew Morris. Prielipp is regarded as one of the top 100 players in the game but has been plagued by injuries throughout his professional career so far.
With a clear opportunity to grab a replacement spot in front of him, Bradley made the decision to withdraw from the upcoming World Baseball Classic, with Betsy Helfand of St. Paul Pioneer Press. The 24-year-old righty informed manager Derek Shelton of the decision this past weekend. He was supposed to play for Team Mexico.
“He said a new manager, a new staff to some extent, a new catcher following (Victor) Caratini, and he felt like the best use of his work during spring training was going to be in our camp,” Shelton explained.
Although he is younger than Woods Richardson, Matthews and Festa, Bradley has the most major league experience on the team. He earned 2.097 years of service time with the Rays and Twins, including 385 1/3 innings as a major leaguer. The former fifth-round pick quickly emerged as one of the sport’s most promising pitching prospects, rising to the No. 20 overall prospect on MLB.com (36th at FanGraphs, 44th at Baseball America) heading into the 2023 season.
Bradley has shown strength at times but has yet to put it all together at the top. He has a career 4.86 ERA due mostly to home run vulnerability (1.49 HR/9). His 25% strikeout rate, 8.6% walk rate and 41.1% ground ball rate all make for a strong profile; metrics like SIERA (4.00) and FIP (4.38) feel like he’s still better than his ERA would indicate, and there’s more to the hard-throwing righty. Bradley averages better than 96 mph on his heater and generates plenty of whiffs with both his splitter and cutter. He is under club control with Minnesota through the 2029 season.
