When the Twins hired Derek Falvey a decade ago, the mission on the mound was clear: find better pitchers, develop them properly and stop wasting talent. Minnesota had spent too long buried near the bottom of the league, with 90-plus losses in five of six seasons, a 4.61 ERA that was the worst in MLB outside Colorado, and a strikeout rate that finished 30th of 30.
Falvey’s arrival was tied directly to that problem. His reputation for pitching development helped land him the job after Terry Ryan, and the front office did move the organization forward.
The Twins climbed from the basement into the middle of the pack in ERA, WAR and strikeout rate, and the 2023 staff was one of the best the club has had in memory. Falvey, assistant GM Jeremy Zoll and others deserve credit for that progress.
But lately, the pipeline has felt stuck.
That’s why the dismissal of Pete Maki as pitching coach points to something bigger than one firing. The Twins have repeatedly identified arms with real upside, only to watch another team unlock them almost immediately.
The front office has found talent. The field staff hasn’t consistently turned that talent into production.
Trevor Megill is the clearest example. On Wednesday night, he finished off Game 4 of the NLDS and sent the Milwaukee Brewers into the league championship series.
Now a trusted closer for a 103-win team, Megill barely made a dent in Minnesota. He posted a 4.80 ERA in 45 innings for the Twins in 2022, then was cut in spring training of 2023.
Milwaukee grabbed him, and the results came fast: a 2.80 ERA, a 2.37 FIP and 81 saves over 190 innings in the four years since. He was an All-Star in 2025.
The talent was visible. A 6-foot-8 reliever with that kind of arsenal doesn’t exactly hide in a bullpen.
Minnesota saw enough to bring him in on a minor-league deal. The Brewers were the ones who turned that bet into a payoff.
Jeff Hoffman followed a similar path. He was in Twins camp in 2023 on a non-guaranteed deal and had some buzz, but he was one of the final cuts. From there, the script flipped the way these stories so often do: Philadelphia got him, he quickly became a real weapon, made an All-Star team, signed a major contract with Toronto, collected 50 saves and eventually came back to the Twins in a trade for a top pitching prospect.
There’s blame on both sides of that one. The front office made the decision to move on, even though Hoffman has credited Maki with helping him build his dominant slider. Still, Minnesota had him there, on the edge of a breakout, and couldn’t get to the point of keeping him in camp and giving him the job.
That’s the larger frustration with the Twins’ pitching operation. They’ve recognized the ingredients.
They haven’t always been able to finish the recipe. Other clubs have.
It has happened with Yennier Cano, Brent Headrick and others. Even some of Minnesota’s developmental wins have come with a twist.
Louis Varland is a success story for the Twins, who turned a Division II pitcher and 15th-round pick into a standout big-league reliever. But after going elsewhere, Varland reached another level.
Ryan Pressly offers a similar reminder. He went from Rule 5 pick to solid reliever before Houston traded for him in 2018, and he immediately became elite.
None of this means the Twins have failed across the board. Joe Ryan and Taj Bradley stand out as solid examples, and Yoendrys Gómez could be next. All three, ironically, came from the Rays.
Still, the list of wins is too short, and the near-misses have piled up, especially in the bullpen. Minnesota has gotten better at finding arms. It has not been good enough at making sure those arms peak in a Twins uniform.
That’s the challenge now for the club’s new pitching hires. With Zoll now leading baseball operations, there’s a new voice at the top and, hopefully, a new dynamic around the pitching staff.
The Twins have spent 10 years improving their ability to identify talent. The next step is making sure they don’t keep watching that talent blossom somewhere else.
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