Berríos loses arb hearing to Twins (source)

MINNEAPOLIS -- Staff ace José Berríos lost his arbitration hearing to the Twins on Thursday and will earn $4.025 million during the 2020 season, a source told MLB.com's Mark Feinsand. Berríos had been seeking a salary of $4.4 million. The ruling has not been confirmed.

That means the Twins now have agreements with all of their arbitration-eligible players for the coming season. Eddie Rosario, Trevor May, Byron Buxton, Tyler Duffey and Taylor Rogers previously settled with the club on one-year contracts at the Jan. 10 deadline to exchange salary figures. Ehire Adrianza and Matt Wisler had also settled with the club well in advance of that date. Miguel Sanó initially did not have an agreement but later signed a three-year, $30 million extension.

The 25-year-old Berríos had a career-best campaign with Minnesota in 2019, lowering his ERA to 3.68 while being named to his second consecutive American League All-Star team. Though he was unable to reach his goal of 20 wins, he went over 200 innings for the first time and increased his strikeout-to-walk ratio for the third straight season. He was in his first year of arbitration eligibility.

It has been fairly rare for the Twins to go all the way to an arbitration hearing with one of their players. The club also beat right-hander Kyle Gibson in a hearing before the 2018 season. That had marked the first such case for Minnesota since it lost back-to-back arbitration hearings to Kyle Lohse in '05 and '06.

Berríos should again be at the helm of the Twins' rotation in 2020, and he has been working with pitching coach Wes Johnson and the club's staff on modifying his workout routine to better prepare him for the rigors of a full season. He and fellow All-Star Jake Odorizzi will headline a rotation that could get crowded throughout the season, with other options set to include Homer Bailey, Michael Pineda, Rich Hill, reportedly Kenta Maeda (assuming the medicals of the Mookie Betts trade clear) and several young arms.