Twins setup man Griffin Jax has quietly emerged as one of many high relievers within the sport, having simply wrapped up a profession yr that included a 2.03 ERA, 34.4% strikeout charge and 5.4% stroll charge in 71 innings. Jax, a former third-round pick of the Air Power Academy, broke into professional ball as a starter, nevertheless, and nonetheless works with a starter’s repertoire even in brief aid stints. The Twins are a minimum of open to the opportunity of seeing what Jax would appear like again in a extra conventional rotation setting, bench coach Jayce Tingler instructed Mike Ferrin of MLB Community Radio on SiriusXM. There’s no indication of any agency plan to maneuver him from his present function proper now, to be clear.
Actually, there’s danger in taking Jax out of a job wherein he’s come to excel. The fitting-hander’s 2024 season was among the many better of any reliever in baseball and set new career-best marks in most notable classes, however Jax has been a top quality setup piece in Minnesota even earlier than this previous season.
Courting again to 2022, the 29-year-old Jax sports activities a 3.06 earned run common with 15 saves, 65 holds, a 28.7% strikeout charge and a 6.4% stroll charge in 208 2/3 innings. He’s added 3 2/3 shutout innings with one hit, no walks and 5 strikeouts in postseason play throughout that point. Jax averaged a career-high 97.1 mph on his four-seamer this season, and his gargantuan 18.4% swinging-strike charge ranked second in all of MLB amongst pitchers (starters and relievers) with a minimum of 70 innings pitched, trailing solely Josh Hader.
Not like most relievers, lots of whom slender their arsenal to 2 pitches, Jax works with a five-pitch combine, throwing 4 of these choices round a 10-30% clip. He makes use of his slider as his predominant providing (37.5%, per Statcast), adopted by a four-seamer (29.9%), changeup (16.7%), sinker (9.8%) and an occasional show-me curveball (6.2%). There are some situations of starters getting by with two-pitch repertoires — greater than 90% of Dylan Stop’s pitches are both a slider or four-seamer; Kevin Gausman is analogous with a four-seamer/splitter combo — however most have a minimum of a 3rd providing that’s blended in with a point of regularity.
Simply yesterday at The Athletic, Eno Sarris took a data-driven look at six relievers who may very well be significantly well-suited to make the bounce from the bullpen to the rotation, prompted by latest information that Jeff Hoffman (one of many six) has been drawing some free agent curiosity as a starter. Jax was featured prominently because of his five-pitch choice, his velocity, two plus breaking balls and his standout command.
The Twins have tried Jax as a starter within the majors beforehand, however that was a special model of Jax. The fitting-hander began 14 video games in 2021 and was shelled for a 6.37 ERA with an 18.1% strikeout charge and eight.1% stroll charge. As Sarris observes, nevertheless, Jax has gained almost 5 miles per hour on his heater — excess of the usual bump acquired when transferring from the rotation to the ’pen — and added three inches of trip to the pitch. He’s additionally added the sinker, modified the form of his curveball and made different good points of word. (Readers are extremely inspired to take a look at Sarris’ piece in full for detailed breakdowns of Jax, Hoffman and 4 different relievers.)
From a pure roster and payroll perspective, there are causes to think about the transfer. The Twins’ payroll has been crunched in 2024-25 after possession unexpectedly slashed it by $30MM final offseason amid broadcast uncertainty and, now, the exploration of a possible sale.
Pitching depth was a difficulty in 2024, as Joe Ryan and Chris Paddack missed the ultimate two months of the yr. The Twins relied on rookies (Simeon Woods Richardson, David Festa, Zebby Matthews) who have been all pushing nicely previous their prior career-high workloads. Jax may have related workload issues, however he’d additionally take some stress off these younger arms. It’s additionally attainable that the payroll crunch leads the Twins to commerce Paddack and his $7.5MM wage — a spendy fifth starter for a crew present process payroll discount mandates — and a beginning function for Jax would add some innings and depth with out additional including to the funds.
Past that, Jax is controllable for 3 extra years. If he’s capable of make a profitable return to the rotation in 2025 — even he’s capped round 120-130 innings — he may very well be a full-fledged rotation possibility in 2026 and 2027. That would give the Twins a rotation headlined by Pablo Lopez, Bailey Ober, Ryan and Jax all through 2027, which clearly carries the potential to be formidable. And, as a result of Jax has been a reliever up to now, his first-year wage projection in arbitration (through MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz) is simply $2.6MM. He’d be an reasonably priced hedge towards an damage to the Twins’ high three or maybe a commerce from the bunch someplace down the street.
After all, transferring Jax to the rotation would skinny out the late-inning aid corps. Nearer Jhoan Duran would nonetheless be tasked with shutting down most video games, however he had some purple flags in 2024, together with a dip in common fastball (to a still-elite 100.5 mph), a drop in strikeout charge and an uptick in line-drives. Former starter Cole Sands had an under-the-radar breakout of his personal (3.28 ERA, 29.1 Ok%, 4.1 BB%), and the Twins can hope for higher well being from Justin Topa and Brock Stewart. Jax’s departure would create a void — however including a top quality reliever to interchange him would probably be less expensive than including rotation depth with related upside.
It’s all the time attainable the Twins may merely check out Jax as a starter in spring coaching and go from there. If he exhibits nicely and appears as much as the problem, the experiment can carry into the season. It’s all the time simpler to stretch a pitcher out earlier than the season after which ramp him again right down to a aid function than it’s to construct him up as a starter on the fly within the season, in order that situation may maintain attraction. All of it’ll rely, to an extent, on what alternatives current themselves this offseason because the Twins look to deepen their pitching and reshape their lineup amid ongoing budgetary points that don’t appear prone to be alleviated throughout the sale course of (and are removed from assured to enhance even after a possible sale).
