Twins eyeing complementary pieces at Deadline

MINNEAPOLIS -- Twins president of baseball operations Derek Falvey knows this won’t be a popular sentiment, but he said he never really felt urgency to make impact additions to his offense, even as it struggled mightily to end the first half.

That’s because Falvey never considered this roster as having the “significant gaps” like he thought of last year’s roster.

Minnesota’s offense has reinforced that belief with this hot start to open the second half, including a four-run first inning against Mariners starter George Kirby on Tuesday night, but there’s certainly need for finishing touches to this roster, as evidenced by how a thin Twins bullpen allowed seven runs in the final two innings to erase a four-run lead in a 9-7 loss at Target Field.

With the likes of Jorge Polanco, Caleb Thielbar, Brock Stewart and Royce Lewis still due back to this roster, Falvey said on Tuesday that he feels some gaps could soon be filled from within. So, as the club’s attention turns fully to next Tuesday’s Trade Deadline, Minnesota is focused on improving, but with more complementary pieces than a big splash.

“I don’t think that we’ll match any of that kind of addition [from those four players], and I don’t think we’re trying to, quite frankly,” Falvey said. “Those are really impactful players. We want to find ways to upgrade our team, but as we look at our group, you think about the bench that we have and those guys coming.”

The message, then, is this: It’s certainly not best to dream about the Shohei Ohtanis of the world, and perhaps not even about the Paul Goldschmidts of the world.

Still, the Twins are firmly planning to add, and Falvey indicated that the majority of the team’s trade conversations are centered around a “complementary bat” and relief help for a bullpen that has too heavily relied on Jhoan Duran and Griffin Jax -- with a lot of hope put on immediate success from Stewart and Thielbar -- though the market is still in flux.

Falvey said Minnesota is still trying to sort through teams that are drifting into the “sell” category, with the sense that most activity will take place in the final 72 hours before the Deadline.

“If you can find a complementary bat that balances you out, whether that’s [from the] right side when you have some guys that are left-handed in some position, or it’s the left side when you think you’re a little more right-handed, we’ll keep an eye on that,” Falvey said.

Though the Twins may not necessarily be prioritizing a bigger move, there’s also an awareness that they have an excess of left-handed corner bats with Max Kepler, Joey Gallo, Alex Kirilloff, Trevor Larnach and Matt Wallner. That’s an area that’s going to be in demand at this Deadline.

Falvey indicated that Minnesota has already fielded plenty of interest in that group in the early stages of the Deadline discussions.

Falvey doesn’t believe the Twins can have too much depth at any position. It’s tough to blame him, given the club’s injury fortunes over the last several years, but he also pointed to the offseason swap with the Marlins of Luis Arraez for Pablo López and prospects as a trade in which Minnesota got what it felt was a good price when dealing from an area of relative excess.

“Less that we are focused on selling from [that depth], but other teams look at you and say, 'OK, you have some good players we like that are left-handed and play corners,’” Falvey said. “Because there are other teams that don't have any of that, and they're dying to get some. … We have a high bar for all of those guys, though.”

And whatever happens at the Deadline, the Twins also know, as they’ve said all along, that their direction will be dictated largely by the performance of the core players already in their clubhouse -- Carlos Correa, Byron Buxton, Kepler and the like -- and that’s where the surge will have to continue.

“Some of our premium guys who are supposed to be the core of our offense were not performing up to their expectations,” Falvey said. “We needed that to happen. We’re not trading for a replacement to any of those types of players.

“Our view is, if those guys can perform the way we expect them to, and the other guys do what they’re supposed to be doing in a complementary way, we’ll be in a better spot.”