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As they begin ramping up their Spring Training activity, the Twins hope that much of their upside will come as a result of better health for Kenta Maeda, Tyler Mahle, Alex Kirilloff and Byron Buxton, among others, a key to improving upon their 78-84 finish in 2022.

They’ll also hope to unlock plenty more upside from Joey Gallo as the latest team to take a chance on the strikeout-prone slugger with prodigious power in the hopes of returning him to the All-Star form he showed in his 2017-21 prime.

That work began in earnest over the offseason, when Gallo paid a three-day visit to San Diego to visit Twins hitting coach David Popkins in an effort to gain familiarity and start erasing “bad habits” he developed last season, when he struggled to a .638 OPS with the Dodgers and Yankees. They’ve since continued FaceTiming, talking on the phone and exchanging swing videos every day, Gallo said during TwinsFest, as the relationship has hit the ground running.

“I already have a great relationship with him,” Gallo said. “It’s just like talking to a friend now. I think it makes it easier, and you can kind of bounce ideas off each other a little bit. Like I said, he knows his stuff, and I’m getting excited to work with him.”

Gallo is 29 and Popkins is 33, and in fact, Gallo even remembers playing against his new hitting coach when they were in the Minors. That age similarity is something that Gallo appreciates, noting that they can communicate and relate to each other easily. Popkins came highly recommended from Carlos Correa, agent Scott Boras and others -- and Gallo has already come away impressed, long before they begin working together in the clubhouse every day.

The slugger is hoping that relationship -- along with being in one clubhouse through a full season -- will help him reestablish a foothold at the plate during his one-year, $11 million deal that doesn’t pose much risk to Minnesota. It’s a deal the Twins were glad to take because they perceive high upside in Gallo, a longtime target with ties to general manager Thad Levine and bench coach Jayce Tingler.

“Success leaves behind clues, and you're trying to pull out the things he's done in the past that are him and keep him understanding his identity,” Popkins said. “Sometimes, we hitters get so focused on what we can't do that you don't really allow yourself to play to your strengths. It's kind of getting back to who he is. He’s a very dangerous hitter.”

The key is that the Twins aren’t trying to reinvent the wheel here. As recently as 2021, Gallo was an All-Star with 38 homers and a career-best 4.2 WAR, according to Baseball Reference. He was sixth in the Majors with 151 long balls from 2017-21 -- sandwiched between Aaron Judge and Bryce Harper.

Popkins says that the goal in a year is to get Gallo’s swing mechanics to become more stable and repeatable, with the hopes that the contact and pitch recognition will come. The strikeouts will always be a part of Gallo’s game, balanced by his ridiculous power.

They have some ideas, but they’ll continue to flesh those out as they feel out their relationship and trust. As camp begins, they’ve already set a strong foundation for that.

“For him, there is a blueprint in a sense of where we've seen him the most successful, and for him, what feels good,” Popkins said. “But year to year, movements change. There's going to be little alterations you can do to make someone swing a little faster, quicker, or be a little shorter. I'm sure that will be natural as we go on. Some of that is to introduce new things and some of the tools we use, and some of it is building on his foundation of what he's already done.”