Minnesota Twins: With Rogers gone, who takes over the ninth?

Since the Minnesota Twins had their Opening Day postponed, they had to do something to cause excitement. That “something” was to trade their closer, Taylor Rogers, and Brent Rooker for Padres pitcher Chris Paddack and Emilio Pagan.

This year will be Paddack’s fourth year in the big leagues, and he will be expected to provide some quality starts for the Twins in the starting rotation. Last year, Paddack had an ERA of 5.07 (3.78 FIP), a WHIP of 1.26, and an 8.2 K/9. Those numbers are not terrible, but certainly, not great.

Hopefully we will see some flashes from his rookie year where he had an ERA of 3.33 in 26 games started. The one stat that worries me is he averaged just under 5 innings pitched per game last season, and that will have to change if he (and the Minnesota Twins) want to be successful this year

As for Pagan, he had posted a 4.83 ERA and a 1.17 WHIP last season with the Padres. Once again, not terrible, but certainly not great. However, I am sure Pagan will play a big role in Minnesota’s bullpen this season.

The big question now is who will fill Taylor Rogers’s role of closer? Tyler Duffey? Caleb Thielbar? Jorge Alcala? Of the pitchers on the MLB roster right now, I would not be surprised if Jorge Alcala was chosen to take on that role. He has kind of proven to have some swing and miss stuff at times, especially his slider.

Another option is to go out and trade for a good closer, especially considering the Minnesota Twins have shown that they are not scared to make trades this year. With the Twins losing yesterday, we didn’t get to see who the new closer would be right away. Hopefully we have a chance to see who will be the closer early on. And hopefully he, whoever it may be, will close the games effectively.