Talking rotation

Derek Falvey at the winter meetings Monday:

Falvey: "I think it's highly likely that one of Dobnak, Thorpe, Smeltzer, that group of guys, is going to be pitching for us early in the season as part of our rotation barring, obviously, injury. That's likely, but we don't want to put too much strain on a lot of that group."1/2

— Betsy Helfand (@betsyhelfand) December 10, 2019

 



Clear as mud, right? Presumably the Twins rotation now looks like

1. Jose Berrios
2. Jake Odorizzi
3. Michael Pineda
4. (veteran to be acquired)
5. (rookie to emerge)

Except that we know Pineda's not pitching in April. He's got the rest of his suspension to serve yet. So maybe Falvey means the "early in the season" rotation projects as:

1. Berrios
2. Odorizzi
3. (veteran to be acquired)
4. (veteran to be acquired)
5. (rookie placeholder for Pineda)

One of the hallmarks of the Terry Ryan era was the placeholder veteran starter. The Twins regularly brought in an older arm on a disposable contract to fill a back-of-the-rotation slot for a while. Sidney Ponson. Ramon Ortiz. Livan Hernandez. They were usually gone by mid May, but in the meantime a prospect had marinated a bit longer in Triple A. And sometimes the veteran was effective enough to last a while longer.

That's an approach I can see Falvine taking here. So yet another potential meaning of Falvey's quote:

1. Berrios
2. Odorizzi
3. (veteran to be acquired)
4. (veteran placeholder for Pineda)
5. (rookie to emerge)

No. 3 in that scenario would, ideally, be somebody along the lines of Madison Bumgarner or Hyun-Jin Ryu -- somebody they're counting on to be a season-long starter. No. 4 would be a different matter.

Theoretically, of course, the veteran placeholder could do well enough to remain in place (as Martin Perez did last season), but that would probably mean that none of the prospects are faring well, and I think that's unlikely. They won't all emerge, but they won't all fail either.