Smeltzer keeps proving he belongs with gem

MINNEAPOLIS -- Devin Smeltzer understands what it means to be a versatile pitcher with remaining Minor League options as part of this Twins organization. It’s a transient lifestyle. He’s called upon when needed, always at the ready, but never afforded a lasting foothold in the Majors.

He’s now lived that lifestyle for four seasons. In 2019, he ping-ponged between Triple-A and the Majors four times before he stuck around for the final month of the regular season. Twice more in 2020, he trekked back and forth between Minneapolis and the alternate training site in St. Paul. This season, he’s up for already a second stint with the big club.

He’s ready to be done with that. He wants to stay. He’s pitching like it, too.

Smeltzer’s seven shutout innings against the Royals on Thursday marked a career high, and his six strikeouts marked his most since his big league debut in 2019. But once he exited the game, Kansas City took advantage with a three-run, go-ahead rally in the eighth inning off Tyler Duffey, and the Twins squandered a bases-loaded, none-out situation as they lost 3-2 in the opener of a four-game series at Target Field.

“You want to stay, the longer you’ve been around,” Smeltzer said. “Your first year, you’re kind of playing with house money. You go up and down and you’re just happy to be here. Once you start to feel more comfortable here, perform, then it gets harder and harder once you get sent back down.”

After not striking out any batters in his previous start against these same Royals last week, Smeltzer fanned six on Thursday, including four with a changeup that he’d only used 16.6 percent of the time entering the game. He said his wife, Brianne, had told him to throw the changeup down and away more often -- and he did.

“[She doesn’t give me advice] often, so I listen when she does,” Smeltzer said.

And let’s get one thing out of the way: There wasn’t any situation in which Smeltzer could have talked himself into staying in the game beyond the seventh inning, manager Rocco Baldelli said, even though the 26-year-old left-hander had given up two singles and had a pitch count of 80 following that frame.

"I think sometimes the decisions are already made, and today, after the seventh, I think it was pretty solidly going to the bullpen,” Baldelli said. “When the decisions are made, there's really no lobbying, no matter how hard they're going to push for it."

Those 80 pitches already marked Smeltzer’s season-high in either the big leagues or Triple-A this season, and he missed most of last season with nerve issues in his pitching arm stemming from a hernia in his neck. The decision to pull Smeltzer -- who has now allowed two earned runs in 17 1/3 innings (a 1.04 ERA) -- made sense in that context, but it immediately led to bullpen issues and missed scoring opportunities that cost the Twins for a second straight game.

With Smeltzer having departed with a 2-0 lead, Duffey allowed singles to Emmanuel Rivera and pinch-hitter Ryan O’Hearn before Whit Merrifield knotted the game with a two-out, two-run double and Bobby Witt Jr. gave Kansas City the edge with an RBI knock. And though the Twins loaded the bases with none out in the eighth inning, they couldn’t plate a run in that situation for a second straight game due to a pair of strikeouts and a groundout elicited by Scott Barlow.

“We had a lot of different ways that we could have won the ballgame today, and that’s going to happen at times,” Baldelli said. “Of course there’s frustration, but you can’t let the frustration overwhelm you in any way.”

They’ll get the job done more often than not when they get outings like the one they got from Smeltzer on Thursday, and when Joe Ryan returns from the COVID-IL, it’ll remain to be seen if the left-hander will still have a place. In the immediate future, the Twins’ doubleheader in Detroit on Tuesday could provide another opportunity for Smeltzer. In the big picture, he thinks he’s done what he can to prove he belongs.

“It's a lot out of my hands,” Smeltzer said. “The work I put in every day, the execution in the games, there's not much else I can do. It's in their hands. There's a business side of this game. Whether you agree with it or not, there is a business side. It can get ugly. Just have to deal with it and keep working.”

"The way Smeltz is throwing, I think we're going to see Smeltz in one way, shape or form going forward right now,” Baldelli said.