When the Twins’ front office traded away 10 players for a cache of prospects, management made it clear it’s looking beyond this season. Rocco Baldelli is not.
When he was asked if he would manage what is now a young team unlikely to make the playoffs, Baldelli quickly rejoined, “Well, we’re going to try to contend, first and foremost.”
“I wouldn’t say, ‘We’re not contending,’ ” Baldelli said before Thursday night’s game against first-place Detroit, the first of a four-game series at Target Field. “I would say we intend to win as many games as we possibly can, and if we can get ourselves in contention, that’s what we’ll be looking for — to aim towards.”
That was a longshot before the trade deadline, when team president Derek Falvey and general manager Jeremy Zoll traded away several of the players who were supposed to help the Twins win the American League Central Division, including star shortstop Carlos Correa, setup man Griffin Jax and hard-throwing closer Jhoan Duran.
On July 28, the Twins were six games under .500 and 6½ games out of a wild card spot with six teams ahead of them. Now Baldelli has a wildly different team, composed mostly of young players still trying to gain a foothold in the majors — some from the Twins organization, some trade partners’ systems, and some of whom are getting their first real taste of the majors.
That’s currently compounded by injuries to starters Pablo Lopez and Simeon Woods Richardson.
On Aug. 1, Baldelli called the team together before a series in Cleveland and told them the last two months won’t just be about evaluating prospects or getting them major league innings.
“I told our guys, ‘I don’t care who you are, you’re playing for something important,’ ” Baldelli said. “That was part of the first message when I stood in front of the team the day after the trade deadline. I told them that and I meant it. That’s not BS. It’s a fact.”
That included, the manager stressed, veterans Joe Ryan, Byron Buxton, Ryan Jeffers and Bailey Ober. And if Lopez weren’t hurt, “I probably would have told him the exact same thing if he was there.”
If anything is clear after the past 20 or so days — on top of the trade deals, the team on Wednesday officially ended its bid to sell — it’s that the future remains unclear.
Everyone is playing for something. Winning remains the goal.
“We have different players, and we’re gonna have to win games differently,” Baldelli said.
Briefly
With Lopez (shoulder) and Woods Richardson (stomach ailment) still on the injured list, the Twins are on pace for another bullpen game on Friday night, likely with Jose Urena taking the first few innings. … Catcher Christian Vazquez, on the IL with an infection in his left shoulder that sent him to the hospital, was at Target Field early Thursday, but Baldelli didn’t have an update on his status.
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