The Twins’ slide out of the American League playoff picture didn’t come from one bad inning or one crushing series. It came from the lineup going cold at the wrong time, with too many regulars and role players failing to deliver when Minnesota needed offense most.
If you’re trying to sort through who hurt the club the most over the final stretch, four names rise to the top: Royce Lewis, Victor Caratini, Ryan Kreidler and Trevor Larnach. Each one dragged in a different way, but the common thread is the same - the Twins kept running into empty at-bats.
Larnach ends up at No. 1 because the expectations are bigger and the margin for error is smaller. His defense has been below average, so the bat has to do the heavy lifting.
Instead, since August 1, he has hit .200/.258/.367 with a .624 OPS and seven extra-base hits in 97 plate appearances. That’s not enough for a corner outfielder on a team trying to stay alive in the postseason race.
He’s also been worth -5 OAA on the season, which only makes the offensive dip harder to absorb. If he isn’t hitting, there just isn’t much value left to offset the rest of the package.
Kreidler’s collapse has been harsher on a statistical level. For a while, he looked like a useful answer at shortstop after Brooks Lee shifted to third base when Royce Lewis went to the minors.
From May 1 through June 30, Kreidler posted an .822 OPS and gave Minnesota solid defense at shortstop. Then everything changed.
Since August 1, he’s slashing .128/.226/.191 for a .418 OPS with 15 strikeouts in 54 plate appearances. The Twins didn’t need star production there; they needed competence.
They didn’t get it.
Caratini’s season looked very different for a stretch in the middle of the year, when he seemed to catch fire after Ryan Jeffers landed on the injured list. At one point, he was so hot that some writers even suggested Minnesota might be comfortable trading Jeffers.
That didn’t last. Since August 1, Caratini has collected just five hits.
The Twins have responded by leaning heavily on Jeffers, starting him in nine straight games recently. Caratini’s overall season was better than the recent slump suggests, but the timing of the downturn was brutal and it leaves real questions about Minnesota’s catching depth heading into 2027.
Lewis rounds out the group, and he’s the one whose case is the most complicated. His season has already included a demotion to Triple-A after a rough first half, followed by a return that made him look like a different hitter.
Over his first 45 games back with the Twins, he put up a .745 OPS and seemed to be settling in at first base. Since August 1, though, he has posted a .702 OPS and struck out 32 times in 140 plate appearances.
That isn’t a disaster, but it isn’t enough from an everyday first baseman, either.
There’s no single hitter you can pin the Twins’ collapse on. That’s not how a season falls apart.
But when the offense needed steady production, these four spots became too easy to pitch around. One cold bat can be survived.
Multiple lineup holes at once turn a contender into a team watching the race from the outside.
In Other News...
Twins May Regret Passing On Their Biggest Offseason Trade Debate
The Twins spent the offseason weighing whether to use one of their best pitching assets to reshape the roster, and the biggest names in that discussion were Joe Ryan and Pablo Lpez. Instead of moving either starter, Minnesota kept both in place and banked on its current core to push the club toward a postseason return, a choice that looked reasonable at the time given how much value each arm carried.
The decision has only grown more complicated since then. Lpezs season-ending elbow injury wiped out his trade value and changed the calculus completely, while Ryan stayed healthy and remained the more obvious chip if the front office had wanted to attack other weaknesses before Opening Day. In hindsight, the Twins may have passed on their best chance to make a meaningful roster reset when the market still offered them real leverage. [Read more 🡒]
Byron Buxton Just Put The Twins 2027 Outfield In Question
Byron Buxton is headed for arthroscopic hip surgery next Friday, another reminder of how carefully the Twins have to handle one of the most gifted players in the organization. The nagging injury has pushed his health back to the center of the conversation, and Minnesota is already weighing ways to help manage his body while trying to preserve the impact he brings when he is on the field.
One possibility being considered is a move out of center field and into a corner spot, a change that could ease the physical toll and potentially lengthen his career. It also adds another layer to the Twins outfield planning, because Buxtons durability has long shaped roster decisions and now leaves Minnesota facing more questions about what its future alignment should look like. [Read more 🡒]
Twins Just Showed Their Next Wave And One Prospect Fans Lost
The Twins latest roster move came with a familiar sort of minor league cost. Jhomnardo Reyes, who turned in a strong rookie ball season with Minnesotas Florida Complex club, was dealt to the Orioles for pitcher Dean Kremer, a reminder that even promising young outfielders can become trade currency when a front office sees a chance to address the big-league side.
Still, Reyes was hardly the only name worth watching in the system this year, and that is what makes this trade feel like part of a larger picture rather than a one-off transaction. Caden Kendle, Adrian Bohorquez, Riley Quick, Ty Langenberg and Paulshawn Pasqualotto all showed meaningful progression, giving the Twins a next wave that looks increasingly real even as one prospect fans had started to notice is now headed elsewhere. [Read more 🡒]