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.

Here’s a fact of life about pitching out of a Major League bullpen when you’re not the closer: You’re almost never one of the more recognizable players on the team, and people only really notice you when you mess up and cost your team the game.

And frankly, Caleb Thielbar really likes it that way.

“I don't care if I get good press,” Thielbar said. “I don't care if people know who I am. I prefer that they don't, to be honest with you. It's nice to go around Minneapolis and never get recognized. It's nice to go and be able to sit down anywhere I want to and not have to worry about that stuff. I don't want it. I don't need it. And maybe that's different for some guys.”

It’ll be tougher for him to maintain his relative anonymity if he keeps pitching the way he has this season -- and bailing his team out of huge spots.

That’s because, at age 35, he’s continued his huge career renaissance, now on his third straight season as a key left-handed arm in the bullpen for his hometown Twins -- and all you need to know about his value to this team is the look of joy on Sonny Gray’s face during the seventh inning of the Twins’ 9-0 victory over the Royals on Tuesday after Thielbar pulled off a high-octane escape to save his starter for a second straight game.

A day earlier, Thielbar had generated a weak flyout and strikeout to strand a pair of Joe Ryan’s runners in a one-run game, too.

Though the surface stat (3.98 ERA) will underrate Thielbar because of a few blow-up outings he had earlier in the season, here’s some food for thought: The left-hander has inherited 33 baserunners this season, and only six have scored (18 percent), nearly half the MLB average of 32 percent.

Across Thielbar’s last 21 outings, since June 22, he has 28 strikeouts and four walks in 19 2/3 innings -- to go with a sparkling 0.92 ERA. While the power arms like Michael Fulmer, Griffin Jax, Jhoan Duran and Jorge López get all the attention in the Minnesota bullpen, Thielbar has quietly been unhittable for most of the summer.

What goes into that success as a “fireman” (putting out others’ fires) for Thielbar?

“You’re looking for guys that are able to pitch in the zone and you still feel confident they’re going to get swings and misses, they’re going to get outs,” manager Rocco Baldelli said.

In fact, Thielbar has the sixth-best swing-and-miss rate on pitches inside the strike zone among all American League pitchers (min. 200 such swings). That’s led to a strikeout rate that ranks second among all single-season marks by left-handed pitchers in club history (min. 40 innings).

It also helps that, when hitters do put the ball in play, it’s tough for them to do anything meaningful with that contact. According to Statcast, Thielbar is in the 100th percentile in the Majors in both average exit velocity and hard-hit rate on balls put in play against him.

This is quite the development for Thielbar, considering 56 percent of inherited runners scored against him last season. What’s his secret?

"I don't know,” Thielbar said. “PitchCom. That's the only thing I can think of. I know what pitch I'm going to throw by the time I get on the rubber. I don't have to think about deciphering signs with guys on second base anymore.”

It perhaps helps that you’ll hardly find anyone more even-keeled than Thielbar, likely helping him stay unassuming and locked-in during those pressure situations -- and don’t let his fist pump and shout after his escape Monday fool you.

“People like that, so sometimes, you've got to fake it a little bit,” Thielbar said. “The next night, I didn't do that. It's just one of those things. Sometimes, I have to think about doing that. It's just not natural. Not to let my secrets out or anything, but I have to think about doing that. It's not something that comes natural.”

Whatever his secrets are, it’s working -- and the Twins are better off for it.