Jake Odorizzi’s return is one big piece of the puzzle for the Twins — now what? (2024)

Two spots down, three more to go.

Jake Odorizzi’s first crack at free agency will have to wait a year, as the 29-year-old right-hander bypassed the open market by accepting the Twins’ one-year, $17.8 million qualifying offer on Thursday. He’s one of just eight free agents in the eight-year history of the current system to accept a qualifying offer and return to their original team, and in doing so Odorizzi rejoins José Berríos in a rotation that remains very much in flux after the departures of Michael Pineda, Kyle Gibson and Martín Pérez. Had Odorizzi declined and signed elsewhere, the Twins would have been in line for a draft pick.

It was likely a difficult decision for Odorizzi, who was hoping to land a multi-year deal following an All-Star, career-best season in which he went 15-7 with a 3.51 ERA and 178 strikeouts in 159 innings while holding opponents to a .231 batting average. Acquired from the Rays two winters ago for a mid-level shortstop prospect (Jermaine Palacios) who has since stalled out in the low minors, Odorizzi bounced back well from a mediocre 2018 season by thriving under first-year pitching coach Wes Johnson, upping his velocity and making several key changes in approach.

Odorizzi was also helped by being shielded from going through lineups for a third time, a source of career-long struggles. Because of that he averaged just 5.3 innings per start — including five innings of two-run ball against the Yankees in the ALDS — and completed more than six innings just twice, but it enabled Odorizzi to be much more effective on a per-inning basis. As one of the majors’ most extreme fly-ball pitchers, Odorizzi shouldn’t be counted on to allow just 16 homers again, but he showed legitimate improvement in other areas and has a career 3.88 ERA.

Almost by definition, anyone receiving a qualifying offer is a very good player. This is Year 8 of the qualifying-offer system and backup catchers, utility men and middle relievers have yet to get one, for good reason — they’d accept it. However, within that star-filled subset of players, there are marginal cases, and Odorizzi falls into that group. I ranked him as the No. 6 free-agent starting pitcher, which makes him the lowest-ranked starter to get a qualifying offer. There’s no shame in that — someone has to be the lowest — but it’s proven to be a burden for other non-elite players.

Jake is back! 🔥 #MNTwins pic.twitter.com/g8Nta4aJSH

— Minnesota Twins (@Twins) November 14, 2019

Last offseason, Craig Kimbrel and Dallas Keuchel found their markets so underwhelming due to having draft-pick compensation attached that they sat out the first two-plus months of the season and waited to sign until after the June draft. Back in 2013, the second year of the qualifying-offer system, both Kendrys Morales and Stephen Drew missed the start of the season and inked prorated one-year deals once they did sign. And during every offseason in between, players have accepted deals below their expected market because teams devalued them due to the draft pick.

In this specific case, Odorizzi is good enough and young enough to think he’d have no shortage of multi-year offers for at least $12-15 million per season if he were an outright free agent. That type of market would make rejecting a one-year, $17.8 million qualifying offer a no-brainer, but of course, he never got the chance to hit the market as an outright free agent. Thanks to the one-time-only qualifying offer, any suitors interested in signing Odorizzi would’ve weighed their interest and their potential offers against the value of the draft pick they’d be giving up.

It’s an extraordinarily team-friendly system and something the MLBPA will almost surely fight to remove from the next Collective Bargaining Agreement, but in the meantime, it puts Odorizzi and players like him in very tricky spots. Does he accept a one-year, $17.8 million deal when he knows he’d be in line for, say, a three-year, $45 million deal if not for a draft pick dragging him down? Or does he reject $17.8 million for one year and go in search of more total money despite knowing that he could wind up like Kimbrel, Keuchel, Morales, Drew and others?

There’s no reason why Odorizzi should have to make that either-or choice. He should be allowed to simply become a free agent and field offers from as many teams as possible with no strings (or draft picks) attached. But within the agreed-upon system, Odorizzi is at a disadvantage that could cost him millions, while the Twins are at an advantage that removes any truly “negative” outcomes from their point of view. They should be happy about Odorizzi accepting $17.8 million for one year because it allows them to keep a good pitcher without requiring a long-term commitment.

His decision also further clarifies the Twins’ pitching-focused plan. Now that Odorizzi is back to go with Berríos in a rotation that’s still three-fifths empty, their current projected payroll is about $85 million (or $92 million if they decide to keep C.J. Cron). Their average Opening Day payroll for the past two seasons was $125 million, and there’s no real excuse for that number not to rise coming off a 101-win season that featured massive attendance and revenue spikes. At worst, it seems safe to assume a minimum payroll of at least $135 million, leaving $50 million unspent.

Or, think of it this way: They could sign a front-line starting pitcher to a long-term deal worth $30 million per season — a salary only a handful of pitchers have ever gotten — and still have $20 million left to fill out the rotation behind their big-money free agent, Berríos and Odorizzi. There are some other areas of the roster that could certainly use improvement, but as president of baseball operations Derek Falvey declared at the beginning of the offseason: “We’re going to target impact pitching.”

What does “impact pitching” mean, exactly? Ahead of the sixth-rated Odorizzi in my free-agent starting pitcher rankings are Gerrit Cole, Stephen Strasburg, Zack Wheeler, Madison Bumgarner and Hyun-Jin Ryu. As far as impact pitching available in free agency goes, that’s one of the best classes ever, meaning the Twins have good timing. Cole and Strasburg might be pipe dreams even if the Twins were to make competitive offers, but Wheeler, Bumgarner and Ryu could each step into the No. 1 spot in the rotation, pushing Berríos and Odorizzi into better fits at 2-3.

From there, the Twins would still have plenty of money and prospect capital to pursue a fourth playoff-caliber starter, perhaps even another impact arm. Re-signing one or both of Pineda and Gibson could be a fit. Other mid-level free agents include Keuchel, Cole Hamels, Alex Wood, Rick Porcello, Rich Hill, Tanner Roark and Julio Teheran. Further rotation help is also available on the trade market, where names such as David Price, Matthew Boyd, Robbie Ray, Jon Gray, and Chris Archer are among those already being speculated about nationally.

It all starts with Odorizzi accepting the qualifying offer. His return on a one-year contract allows the Twins to keep the payroll books clean beyond 2020 — a key consideration if they’re making big long-term offers to “impact pitching” — and provides some peace of mind knowing that they won’t come up completely empty no matter what happens in free agency. They ended last season with Berríos and Odorizzi as their top two starters, so maintaining that status quo isn’t in itself a step forward, but it removes risk and puts the Twins in better position to make a bigger splash.

(Top photo: Mark Brown / Getty Images)

Aaron Gleeman is a staff writer for The Athletic covering the Minnesota Twins. He was previously the editor-in-chief of Baseball Prospectus and a senior writer for NBC Sports. He was named the 2021 NSMA Minnesota Sportswriter of the Year and co-hosts the "Gleeman and The Geek" podcast. Follow Aaron on Twitter @AaronGleeman