Twins acquire Floro from Marlins for Jorge López

MINNEAPOLIS -- Though Jorge López's tenure with the Twins didn’t result in him becoming a high-leverage, back-end reliever for several years, as they’d hoped, his final act on the Target Field mound was one of triumph before Minnesota elected to move on.

On Wednesday afternoon, López was on the move for a second consecutive Trade Deadline -- sent to the Marlins in a one-for-one swap that brought right-handed reliever Dylan Floro to the Twins in a move announced by both teams following Minnesota’s 8-7 loss against the Mariners.

Minnesota has made no secret that its bullpen could look different following Tuesday’s Trade Deadline, and after the depletion of the relief corps figured into a pair of tough, high-scoring losses to Seattle to end this homestand, this move got the shuffle underway.

TRADE DETAILS
Twins receive: RHP Dylan Floro
Marlins receive: RHP Jorge López

López was one of the centerpieces of the Twins’ acquisitions at last season’s Trade Deadline in a deal that sent top prospect Cade Povich, 2023 All-Star reliever Yennier Cano and a pair of low-level Minor Leaguers to the Orioles.

But López struggled to harness his exemplary stuff, posting a 4.37 ERA in 23 appearances for the Twins in 2022 and a 5.09 ERA this season.

Though Minnesota sank considerable prospect capital into securing the controllable López, it’s unclear that he might have made it all the way back into consistently pitching in leverage situations for the ‘23 team, which needs immediate bullpen help -- and Floro might be a candidate to offer more consistency in that regard.

Set to become a free agent after this season, Floro has a 4.54 ERA with 41 strikeouts in 39 2/3 innings, pitching as one of Miami’s leverage options for much of this season before dropping down their bullpen hierarchy of late.

Floro has a 3.32 career ERA in eight seasons with the Rays, Cubs, Reds, Dodgers and Marlins, and he even accumulated 32 saves for Miami in the past three seasons.

The underlying numbers could indicate that the 32-year-old Floro has pitched better than those stats could indicate, as shown by his 2.78 FIP (which strips away events outside the pitcher’s direct control) and 3.24 expected ERA (as computed by Statcast based on the quality of batted-ball contact).

Floro has struggled against left-handed hitters this season, who have combined for a .980 OPS against him, as opposed to a .594 OPS by right-handed hitters. But even another mid-leverage matchup option could help the Minnesota bullpen, which has relied very heavily on Griffin Jax and Jhoan Duran in all sorts of tight games.

While the Twins await the returns of Caleb Thielbar (right oblique strain) and Brock Stewart (right elbow soreness) to the leverage mix, they’ve had to try to piece the middle-innings puzzle together with Jordan Balazovic, Emilio Pagán, Jovani Moran and Oliver Ortega.

That played a part in seven runs allowed in the final two innings of Tuesday’s loss, and again when the Mariners tacked on three insurance runs off Balazovic in Wednesday’s fifth inning. López didn’t quite make it back into that mix, but perhaps Floro could.

It’s likely that the Twins will still be in the mix for bullpen help along with their need for a complementary right-handed bat, as indicated by president of baseball operations Derek Falvey on Tuesday -- but they would also like to maintain some flexibility for optionable arms or young pitchers to rotate, too.

“The reality of baseball is, I think, everyone thinks you have X number of bullpen spots, just upgrade the last guy, just upgrade the last two guys,” Falvey said. “But when you lack optionality in any of the bullpen spots, that really jams you up.”

López spent two weeks on the 15-day IL in late June for a mental health reset, and though the club hoped he’d find consistency in lower-leverage situations following his return, he posted a 5.40 ERA in eight subsequent outings. But he finished his Twins tenure with a scoreless 10th inning to earn the victory in Monday’s series opener against the Mariners.

“I missed it,” López said on Monday of returning to a high-leverage situation. “I really missed it. It's been two months, which has been a real struggle to get those outs with men on base with no outs.

“We know how hard it is. Just something that we keep progressing [on] to get better. I think we are on the right [path].”