12 Days of Twinsmas: #6 Johan Santana

If you thought I was talking about Johan Santana, then you would be correct. As a young Twins fan living in Minnesota in the mid-2000s, the first pitcher I can remember watching in person was Johan. Johan was an exciting pitcher who captivated Twins fans with his outstanding stuff, especially his changeup.

Rule 5
Johan Santana was born in Venezuela in 1979. In 1995, he was signed as an amateur free agent by the Houston Astros. After three seasons in the minor leagues in which he was 17-17 with a 5.05 ERA, the Astros left him unprotected in the 1999 Rule 5 Draft. In the Rule 5 Draft, Santana was drafted by the Marlins and immediately traded to the Twins for Twins legend Jared Camp.

In 2000, Santana made his Twins debut despite never pitching above single-A ball. Santana was used mostly out of the bullpen, appearing in 30 games over his rookie season and throwing 86 innings with a 6.49 ERA and a 5.26 FIP. 2001 was rather uneventful as well, as Santana posted a 4.74 ERA in 43 innings.

A Change of Pace
In 2002, the Twins started Santana at AAA in hopes of converting him from a reliever to a starter. While at AAA, Santana developed an absolute weapon. The pitching coach for the AAA team, Bobby Cuellar, taught Santana about the importance of throwing a changeup. Cuellar knew Santana needed an elite pitch to pair with his fastball to be effective at the Major League level, so he worked with Santana on his changeup, often having him throw it in traditional fastball counts or having him throw seven straight changeups in games. In late May, the Twins called Santana back up and he was very good the rest of that year, going 8-6 with a 2.99 ERA. Another very encouraging sign that he was developing more swing-and-miss stuff was that he had 137 strikeouts in 108 innings, compared to 92 strikeouts in 129 innings the two years prior.

Dominance
After a very encouraging 2002 campaign, Santana had a great 2003, going 12-3 with a 3.07 ERA. He also decreased his BB/9 from 4.1 to 2.7. All signs were pointing towards a Santana breakout.

From 2004 to 2006, Santana had the most dominant three year stretch by any Twins pitcher ever. During this time period, Santana was the best pitcher in baseball. He was 55-19 (most wins in MLB), threw 693 innings (3rd), struck out 748 (1st), had a 2.75 ERA (2nd), 2.92 FIP (2nd), and led all MLB pitchers in WAR (20.4). 

Santana’s stretch was historically great. In MLB history, there are only three left handed pitchers to have three seasons or more of 200+ innings pitched, an ERA under 3, a WHIP under 1, and 220+ strikeouts. These pitchers are Sandy Koufax, Clayton Kershaw, and Johan Santana.

Highway Robbery
For his excellent work, Santana won the Cy Young in 2004 and 2006 and got second place in 2005. However, Santana should’ve won it in 2005.

In 2005, Bartolo Colon won the Cy Young award in the American League. However, it should’ve been Santana. Here is a comparison of their 2005 statistics:

Colon ERA: 3.48, Santana ERA: 2.87
Colon IP: 222.2, Santana IP: 231.2
Colon SO: 157, Santana SO: 238
Colon ERA+: 122, Santana ERA+: 155
Colon FIP: 3.55, Santana FIP: 2.80
Colon WHIP: 1.159, Santana WHIP: 0.971
Colon fWAR: 4.1, Santana fWAR 7.1

Any sensible baseball mind would be able to see that Santana was clearly a better pitcher in 2005 and he was robbed of having three consecutive Cy Young awards.

Goodbyes
In 2007, Santana had another good season, going 15-13 with a 3.33 ERA and leading the American League in WHIP. However, he demanded a lot of money out of the Twins as he would be a free agent after the 2008 season. The Twins offered him a four year, $80 million extension, which he declined. The Twins wanted to get some value for him, so they traded Santana to the New York Mets for Carlos Gomez, Deolis Guerra, Phillip Humber, and Kevin Mulvey. He then agreed to a six year, $137.5 million deal with the Mets.

Santana had a successful four year stretch with the Mets, going 46-34 with a 3.18 ERA and accumulating 13.9 fWAR. On June 1st, 2012, Santana had a magical start. He threw a complete game no-hitter in a legendary pitching performance. He recorded the last out on a disgusting changeup. This is one of the most memorable moments of Santana’s career.

2012 would prove to be his last year in professional baseball because of a torn anterior capsule in his left shoulder. This is not an ideal way to end such an illustrious career, but Johan was still an outstanding talent either way.

Twins Legend
The Twins have won four Cy Young awards, and two of them are Santana. Both of Santana’s awards were unanimous decisions. Among Twins pitchers all-time, Santana has the best ERA+ (141) and the fourth best fWAR (31.7). Santana was inducted into the Twins Hall of Fame in 2018 and appeared on the MLB Hall of Fame ballot in 2018, but only received 2.4 percent of the vote so was removed the following year. This is very unfortunate because every pitcher who has three Cy Youngs is in the Hall of Fame or will most certainly be inducted after they retire. If Santana would have won that 2005 Cy Young award he most likely would be on the ballot this upcoming year.

Conclusion
Johan Santana was the most dominant pitcher in Twins history and was a major part of the successful Twins teams of the 2000s. Santana is a beloved figure in Twins history and is the sixth best player in Twins history.

Stay tuned for the eighth day of Twinsmas!

Thank you for reading, and Go Twins!

Read Previous "12 Days of TwinsMas" articles here:
#12 - Torii Hunter
#11 - Chuck Knoblauch
#10 - Jim Kaat
#9 - Frank Viola
#8 - Kent Hrbek
#7 - Tony Oliva
#6 - Johan Santana
#5 - Coming Soon!