Ober's max effort nets first quality outing

MINNEAPOLIS -- The outcome didn’t play in the Twins’ favor on Tuesday night, but if they continue to get these kinds of pitching performances from Bailey Ober and the other rookies in their rotation, the club should fare just fine down the stretch.

The question of how long Minnesota will continue to give Ober these opportunities could continue to arise throughout the coming months as the rookie right-hander surpassed his professional career high in innings with six frames against Cleveland, but nothing about his performance has suggested that he should be held back -- even as he took the loss in a 3-1 Twins defeat at Target Field.

“His stuff, since the day we got him here at the big league level, has been better than, really, what he was throwing previously,” manager Rocco Baldelli said. “You don't see that very often, but I will say this -- I credit the young man for the work that he puts in, because he's very, very diligent.”

Ober’s first career quality start might have been enough to give the Twins a victory on most nights, but the bats fell silent against Cleveland right-hander Eli Morgan. Minnesota twice loaded the bases with none out, but emerged with only one run to show for it. A strikeout and 1-2-3 double play squashed a second-inning rally, while two groundouts and a strikeout did the same in the eighth.

The rookie’s outing was aided by a highlight-reel double play turned by the Minnesota defense in the sixth inning. Center fielder Rob Refsnyder drifted to the warning track, made a leaping snag on Wilson Ramos’ deep fly ball and began a relay back to first base, where the throw beat José Ramírez to double him off.

Though the defense behind Ober also cost him an unearned run in that inning when that play plated a runner created by a Miguel Sanó error, he still overcame two miscues behind him for an efficient, 69-pitch start. He allowed five hits and three runs -- of which two were earned.

That brought Ober's season total to 79 2/3 innings between the Minors and Majors, surpassing his previous season high of 78 2/3. His body still feels good and his stuff is better than ever. The significance of that isn’t lost on him.

“It's awesome,” Ober said. “It's a lot of credit to my great support staff that I have with the Twins and all the guys back in the offseason program back home in Denver. Just got a lot of good people around me and a lot of people putting in time with me, and that's allowed me to be here right now.”

Ober’s injury-riddled path to the big leagues began with Tommy John surgery while with the College of Charleston in 2015, which gave way to 28 innings in rookie ball in ‘17 following his selection in the 12th round of that season’s MLB Draft.

He was then limited to 75 innings with Class A Cedar Rapids in 2018 after he was shut down in July with a right elbow strain. Those elbow issues persisted throughout the 2019 season, with extended stints on the injured list for right ulnar nerve subluxation and right elbow inflammation limiting him to 78 2/3 innings across the rookie, Class A Advanced and Double-A levels.

And even as he posted an 0.69 ERA that season, Ober said he felt awful throughout that year, pitching through pain due to his suboptimal mechanics. Though he subsequently got help from the Twins in fixing those mechanics, he had to sit out the entire 2020 season due to the pandemic.

Talk about an unconventional path through the Minors.

"Pretty amazing that we're even talking about this,” Baldelli said. “It's such a unique situation.”

That’s why the Twins have handled Ober extremely carefully this season, limiting him to an average of 73 pitches per outing through his 14 starts. That’s part of why it took him so long to earn his first quality start: often, he’d be pitching well enough to go deeper into games, but the club’s desire to keep him healthy for 2022 has taken precedent in limiting his workload on a game-by-game basis.

And thanks to his new mechanics, his fastball is well up from the 87-90 mph range he often sat in 2019, topping out at 94.7 mph twice in a June 30 start and maintaining well through the season, to the point where he peaked at 94.4 mph against Cleveland. These are previously unseen heights in his stuff -- and the 4.38 ERA has followed.

The Twins won’t necessarily expand his workload this season, but they’ll keep trotting him out as long as he feels healthy -- and there’s no reason yet to believe that won’t continue.

“I've continued to hopefully keep pushing that,” Ober said. “I'm feeling really good right now. Body's feeling great. I'm going to keep going and doing what I'm doing, and hopefully I keep doing well.”