It’s been a quiet offseason for the Minnesota Twins, but slowly the team is starting to make moves. Nothing major has happened yet, and it seems unlikely they’ll be adding any big free agents, rather the Twins are bargain shopping before hopefully making a more significant move.
That move will probably involve trading Jorge Polanco or Max Kepler — or both — two acquire starting pitching help. In the meantime the team is softly addressing the bullpen, having added yet another minor player with potentially high-upside.
Minnesota claimed former Chicago Cubs first-round pick Ryan Jensen off waivers on Thursday. Nothing about that sends strong signals that the move is expected to have a huge payoff, as first-round picks on waivers is never good nor is the fact that it wasn’t the Cubs who waived him.
The Twins claimed righthander Ryan Jensen off waivers from the Marlins. He was in AA and AAA last year with the Cubs and Mariners.
— Bobby Nightengale (@nightengalejr) January 4, 2024
The Marlins picked up Jensen after the Cubs waived him back in 2022 but he failed to catch on in Miami. Jensen was drafted as a starter but ended up transitioning into a relief role that he’s still trying to settle into.
If there’s any way to look at this deal it’s as depth. Jensen has first-round potential but he doesn’t have a secondary pitch outside of a fastball that reaches the upper-90s. That’s sort of the deal with him, as he seems to have part of the picture figured out but not the whole thing.
Will he end up doing that with the Twins?
Jensen’s addition is the second bullpen arm in a week that the Twins have secured. The team signed former Royals reliever Josh Staumont to a cheap deal after Christmas and clearly have their eye on the bullpen bargain bin.
The real question is when will the Twins elevate their moves from these low-end types to the more high-end purchases. Using Kepler and Polanco as currency remains the best way to make an addition, but at some point something bigger than these sorts of deals needs to happen.
History says it will, but until then waiting around for something major to happen continues to be a slog.