Two big questions for Twins in the second half of 2024

This story was excerpted from Do-Hyoung Park’s Twins Beat newsletter. To read the full newsletter, click here. And subscribe to get it regularly in your inbox.

The Twins passed the halfway point of their 2024 season on Thursday, when top pitching prospect David Festa made his highly anticipated MLB debut as part of a 13-6 victory over the D-backs at Chase Field that improved Minnesota's standing to 45-36 through 81 games.

That’s five games better than they were at the halfway mark of the 2023 season, when they were 40-41 and went on to not only win the AL Central, but also win their first playoff series since ‘02.

But the feel of this season has been so different, for two reasons: Firstly, their path to 46-37 has been so inconsistent, with long swaths of winning juxtaposed opposite long swaths of losing, with seemingly no middle ground. Secondly, despite their improved record, they’re seven games out of first place because of Cleveland’s shocking success.

Yes, this team has seen some infuriatingly slow stretches of offense, but in the big picture, the Twins also lead the Major Leagues in runs (332), team batting average (.265) and team wRC+ (122) since they bottomed out at 7-13 on April 21.

They’re here despite having gotten extremely low-end outcomes from a host of their key contributors in Pablo López (4.88 ERA), Jhoan Duran (velocity down, 3.65 ERA), Louie Varland (struggled, then demoted), Alex Kirilloff (struggled, then injured), Edouard Julien (struggled, then demoted), Matt Wallner (struggled, then demoted) and Royce Lewis (injured for most of the season).

They’ve seemingly left a ton on the table in terms of their potential -- and yet, here they still are.

Here are two big questions I have for the second half:

1. Who would start games in the playoffs?

You still have to believe that López will figure things out (recent signs have been more encouraging after the Twins corrected some overstriding in his delivery) and the actual results will catch up to the solid peripherals as a Game 1 starter. But who would go behind him?

Minnesota was counting on one of Joe Ryan, Bailey Ober and Chris Paddack to emerge as a No. 2 behind López, but only Ryan has made close to any meaningful case. The Twins clearly didn’t trust Ryan last October, but his stuff is up this year -- and they stayed away from Ober in the playoffs until the schedule forced their hand.

Stuff-wise, Festa could assert himself as an option with a good season, but would the Twins put that on a rookie? It’s becoming clearer that Varland isn’t the answer in the rotation, either.

Will the Twins have to address this via trade using a farm system from which they’ve already traded away a plethora of meaningful prospects across the last few Trade Deadlines? Or will they count on the talent within and preserve that depleted prospect depth, especially when doing so would increasingly mortgage their future for -- people perhaps don’t want to hear this -- a crapshoot in the playoffs where variance comes for even the most solidly constructed teams?

2. What does the best version of the position player group look like?

The best version of this team come September and October will include Brooks Lee. I fully expect that he’ll have a prominent role by the end of the season, if healthy. Take that to the bank.

But where will Lee eventually fit? In the interest of depth, the Twins have weathered the struggles of Kyle Farmer, but it seems that he’s at the point where, even in his niche (hitting against lefties), he’s hitting towards the bottom of the lineup.

You could argue that playoff games are exactly the scenario where you’d want a player like Farmer -- a veteran who is perhaps the second-best infield defender on the team -- because those traits are much more impactful in close games, where poise and mistake-free baseball become more important than ever.

And Austin Martin hasn’t been playing much in this roster configuration despite not having seemed over his head at any point -- and he does have Minor League options.

As always, injuries can answer this question in a hurry.