FORT MYERS, Fla. — Realistically, there’s no replacing Pablo López’s all-around impact, but that’s the challenge facing the Minnesota Twins after losing the All-Star right-hander to a likely season-ending elbow injury on the first day of full-squad spring training.
Any positive momentum the Twins were hoping to build under new manager Derek Shelton came to a screeching halt Monday afternoon when López walked off the mound and toward what is expected to be the second Tommy John surgery of his career, 12 years after the first.
It was already difficult to find many people outside of the Twins’ clubhouse and the owners’ suite optimistic about their chances of having a successful 2026 season, with prominent projection systems and odds-makers predicting another losing record, and now they’ll attempt to do so without one of the best pitchers in the league.
“He’s here at the crack of dawn every day and just works his tail off, and does the same thing in season,” Joe Ryan said of López, his rotation mate since 2023. “He just set such a good example for everyone, myself included. I’ve learned a lot from him, so it just sucks to lose him this early.”
“It just sucks” would suffice as an accurate summation of the situation for the Twins and for López, who has a well-earned reputation as one of the smartest and hardest-working people in baseball, in addition to his obvious pitching talent.
But let’s delve a little deeper into the domino effect of López’s injury.
How big is the loss of López?
It’s a testament to how well López has performed since the Twins acquired him in a January 2023 trade with the Miami Marlins that he was able to so quickly change the minds of many fans initially upset about giving up the wildly popular Luis Arraez in the deal.
López has a 3.68 ERA in 78 total starts for the Twins, with 505 strikeouts in 455 innings. Johan Santana, Bert Blyleven and Dean Chance are the only pitchers with more career starts and a better ERA+ in a Twins uniform than López, and that doesn’t even include his postseason success.
López joins Santana and Brad Radke as the only Twins pitchers to start multiple playoff wins in the past 30 years, and his seven shutout innings against the Houston Astros, on the road, in Game 2 of the 2023 ALDS is one of the best pitching performances in team history.
Since trading for López, the Twins have played at a 95-win pace with him on the mound and a 77-win pace in games started by anyone else.
External expectations for the 2026 Twins were low even before López’s injury. FanGraphs and Baseball Prospectus projected them for a losing record and playoff odds around 30 percent. BetMGM’s over/under was 73 1/2 wins, which owner Tom Pohlad called “ridiculous” when asked about it Monday morning.
One day and one López injury later, FanGraphs and Baseball Prospectus dropped their Twins projections by more than a full game, to 78.6 and 78.5 wins, respectively. BetMGM’s over/under remains unchanged for now, but 73 1/2 was already the third-lowest in the American League and substantially lower than the projections.
Any notion of the Twins having a winning 2026 relies heavily on the rotation, which team officials have touted as a major strength since last year’s trade deadline. That was based on having veterans López, Joe Ryan and Bailey Ober atop the rotation, with some combination of younger starters Simeon Woods Richardson, Taj Bradley, Mick Abel, Zebby Matthews and David Festa emerging as dependable options.
Prior to López’s injury, FanGraphs projected the Twins’ rotation to rank 11th out of 30 clubs, which is short of the range typically required to carry an otherwise middling roster to the playoffs. Now, with López out, the rotation has dropped to 14th, merely average rather than a strength relative to the league as a whole.
Wh0 are the options to replace López?
Not surprisingly, given that spring training is underway, the free-agent pitching market has been thoroughly picked over. Framber Valdez was the last unsigned front-line starter, and Pohlad confirmed Monday the Twins expressed interest in him, but the two-time All-Star agreed to a three-year, $115 million deal with the divisional rival Detroit Tigers on Feb. 10.
Lucas Giolito, Zack Littell and Max Scherzer are the only unsigned starters ranked among The Athletic’s top 50 free agents. Giolito and Littell are presumably willing to settle for one-year deals at this point. Scherzer is 41, so he’d also likely settle for a one-year deal, but it’s not clear the likely future Hall of Famer would want to spend the twilight of his career in Minnesota.
It’s also not clear whether the Twins are focused on replacing López by bringing someone in, whether via free agency or trade. General manager Jeremy Zoll seemed to indicate in-house options were far more likely when asked about that possibility moments after López’s injury diagnosis was made public on Tuesday.
“We spent a lot of this offseason talking about the strength of our roster being in the rotation depth, and view it as a real opportunity as a next man up,” Zoll said. “In a lot of ways, we view this as a real opportunity for someone to step up and take advantage.”
Zoll specifically named all of the usual suspects — Woods Richardson, Bradley, Matthews, Abel, Festa — who could be asked to step into López’s spot in the rotation, as well as two other spots seemingly up for grabs behind Ryan and Ober. Shelton echoed a similar sentiment, right down to using the same “next man up” phrasing.
“We have starting pitching depth,” Shelton said. “This gives some of our younger pitchers an opportunity to step up. Our younger players have to have that next-man-up mentality. OK, you know Pablo possibly has an injury that would cause him to miss significant time. So, who’s the next person that’s going to step into that role?”
Pohlad has repeatedly insisted he wants to be aggressive and is willing to increase the payroll, but that hasn’t happened yet, and it’s worth noting the in-house options would cost a fraction of a veteran free agent’s salary. But even if the Twins are willing to sign Giolito or Littell for, say, $10 million, are they better bets than the younger, cheaper arms?
FanGraphs’ projected ERAs have Littell (4.62) and Giolito (4.67) worse than Matthews (4.00), Festa (4.10), Bradley (4.25), Woods Richardson (4.39) and Abel (4.50), which is an argument for staying in-house. There’s also upside in giving the in-house options an extended runway, because they could play big roles in the rotation’s future if things go well.
On the other hand, there’s no such thing as too much rotation depth and, regardless of whether a veteran free agent would actually be an upgrade, Twins fans probably wouldn’t mind seeing the front office spend $10 million, if only as proof that Pohlad’s words can turn into action.
Trading for a comparable veteran starter is also a viable option, but that would require parting with both money and prospect capital, the latter of which may not be worth giving up to provide a modest boost to a team that could be headed for a losing season either way.
“You can never have enough starting pitching depth,” Shelton said. “I mean, there’s no manager in the world who’s going to tell you, regardless of how many guys they have, it’s too much. You realize it’s not going to take just five starters all year long.”