The Twins are in full-go mode now at Spring Training in Fort Myers, Florida, with their first exhibition game coming up this weekend.
There's a few differences at the top of the organization with longtime President Dave St. Peter stepping aside and Derek Falvey stepping into a larger role as President of Baseball and Business Operations for the team. Falvey previously ran the baseball side only, with a general manager under him, which until the end of the 2024 season, was Thad Levine.
Now a new name for Twins fans steps into the crucial role within the organization as Jeremy Zoll takes over GM duties. Zoll is entering year eight with the organization and he took some time to talk to WCCO's Jason DeRusha in Fort Myers about his role and how he feels about the club heading into 2025.
You're maybe not a name that the fans necessarily knew, but within the front office here. The team has always spoke of you with really a lot of respect. What what is it like for you now being in that top job as the general manager?
Well, thank you. I appreciate that. You know, taking the next step, you shift from having like a clear purview, player development, performance, team, have been my focus basically my whole time with the organization. And now to take on additional oversights over scouting operations through amateur, international pro, etc. And really working with those teams. It just kind of adds extra layers and things to be thinking about.
But, love our team, love our people, and feel really good about those processes we're putting into place.
Fans, of course, nobody likes how last season ended up. On top of it, the fact that there has been a stated budget focus for the front office. I think a lot of people were surprised over the last week that some of the purse strings were opened up a little bit. Tell us about some of these late signings that came in and the fact that some flexibility came in to be able to have some budget?
Feeling really good about the ability to make the auditions we did over the last week or two here and grateful for the additional resources that came through to be able to make those things happen.
You know, Danny Columbe was the first domino here, left-handed reliever, felt like that was a real opportunity for us to stabilize and in what we think is going to be a really good bullpen. But to add someone that has proven to be a real weapon from the left side, we think that it was a really good add for us.
Then Harrison Bader was second. Harrison's been an elite defender, one of the top defenders in all of baseball for the last five or six years at this point. His ability to play centerfield and provide that additional layer of depth behind Byron Buxton, something we're really valuing, so that when Byron is either DH'ing or needs a day off, we feel like we're not missing a beat with his defense. Obviously, Harrison's right-handed, so his ability to compliment Matt Wallner and Trevor Larnick, if they need a day down against the lefty or they're DH'ing, whatever it may be, we think Harrison's gonna really round out that outfield group really nicely here.
And then lastly, Ty France we added into the mix, right-handed bat. That's a big deal. That's big because the infield has been really a bit of a defensive question mark, right? So we have a group that is really versatile and can play a lot of different spots. You're going to see in camp a number of different guys playing first base, whether it's Eddie Julien or Jose Miranda, but bringing in Ty France was something that we felt like just gave us one more layer of insulation here. Ty's been a proven hitter at various points throughout his career. He'll be the first to tell you he took a step backwards last year, but he feels like he really got back to some foundational elements this offseason. We think he's a really strong bounce back candidate and right-handed bat for us.
Is this more of a trend in baseball to see this sort of player who have the ability, like a Royce Lewis, he can play third, maybe he could play second. I don't remember, is this a baseball thing or a Twins thing?
Yeah, I think it's something we're really priding ourselves on,, and feel like it really helps our team in so many different ways. So when you do have a player go down with injury,, you have a lot of different ways to plug those holes. It's definitely a point of emphasis for us within.
When you're trying to build the team, how do you, how do you go about that? Is it a Moneyball thing? Is it trying to get the bargain, get the dinged up guy who's got one more go in him? How do you approach that? Because you can't change the underlying economics of baseball.
Totally. I think from our perspective, we recognize that for us to be really competitive year in and year out, we're gonna have to nail scouting and player development. And scouting is amateur scouting, it's international scouting, and it's professional scouting, but be really good at the blocking and tackling there and to get really good outcomes to have a young core that can constantly be entering into our major league group and impacting the major league team.
Which is something that we think we have right now and continuing to push along. But it requires us to be willing to take chances and take risks in the minor leagues. We're trying to catch these like ninety-fifth, ninety-ninth percentile outcomes for players. They want to chase those outcomes too.
If you could add one piece to this lineup, what would it be?
That's a good question. I think at this point, we're feeling like between that versatility and star power at the top with Correa and Buck and Royce, we're feeling like we're in a really good spot.
The Twins open Grapefruit League play in Fort Myers this Saturday, February 22 against the Atlanta Braves at 12:00 p.m. You can hear the game live on 830 WCCO and on the Audacy App.