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The Twins offseason did not leave a great taste in the mouths of the fanbase before the CBA lockout commenced. The only addition to a rotation in need of at least three more reliable options was rebound-candidate Dylan Bundy with few high-end free agent options left.
As a result, it sounds like the Twins could lean heavily on internal options. Much attention is rightfully drawn to the shiny prospects we haven’t seen yet, but people seem to be forgetting about Randy Dobnak.
Dobnak’s popularity comes from more than his entertaining story and killer ‘stache. He was leaned on heavily down the stretch in 2019 en route to a surprising division title. He posted a 1.59 ERA in 28 1/3 innings as a whole and got off to a similar start in 2020. After a miserable 2021 where his ERA neared 8, however, why is Dobnak first in line for an opportunity?
For starters, his 2021 needs to be taken with a grain of salt. His grip on the slider was reportedly changed before the season, and it just never really took. His expected batting average on the pitch rose from .204 to .356. Before he could attempt to make the necessary adjustments, he injured his right middle finger, a pivotal body part in executing a pitch.
Baseball being a game of adjustments, it’s safe to assume Dobnak will spend this offseason trying to figure out what went wrong. He’ll surely continue to tweak his signature whiff pitch and could always pivot back to his previous grip on the slider if all else fails.
Health is also a factor, as it’s easy to see how a new slider could end up finding inopportune parts of the strike zone more often when the finger used to guide it is in pain. The Twins shut Dobnak down rather than having him continue to fight through it, so the hope is that the extra time he was given has him fully healthy and ready to compete pain-free in 2022.
Dobnak has also already earned the trust of the organization, and for good reason. He was thrust into a Game 2 playoff start in Yankee Stadium during his rookie season. Despite the results, paired with how much he helped the Twins rotation in 2019 and 2020 far outweighs his struggles during a 2021 season where it seemed like nobody lived up to expectation. The approximate $9m invested into the contract that will keep Dobnak in Minnesota through 2026 isn’t incredibly high, but the Twins surely won’t call that a sunk cost just yet.
The fact of the matter is Dobnak is probably somewhere in between the sub 2.00 ERA pitcher we saw when he debuted and the one that posted a near 8.00 ERA in 2021. He won’t be the savior that shores up the front of the rotation, but profiling him behind Bailey Ober and Joe Ryan isn’t absurd. He’s a groundball artist who limits home runs and walks which is more than enough for a pitcher to settle into a solid career on a good baseball team.
The pitching pipeline does grow ever closer to the Major Leagues with pitchers like Jhoan Duran and Josh Winder finally having reached AAA. It appears there will almost certainly be rotation spots to contend for during Spring Training, however, and Randy Dobnak would be my odds on favorite to get some run early in the year. It’s easy to forget after a miserable 2021, but if handed a rotation spot, there’s a chance Randy Dobnak simply doesn’t give it back.
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