FORT MYERS, Fla. -- When Sonny Gray threw his first bullpen session with the Twins, there was a peanut gallery of young pitchers standing in a half-circle around him, watching his every move.
Joe Ryan crouched in the corner. Bailey Ober leaned against the mesh barrier behind Gray, watching pitch data as it flashed on an iPad. Jordan Balazovic and Josh Winder, the organization's Nos. 5 and No. 7 prospects per MLB Pipeline, stood with their arms crossed. Everyone observed intently as Gray commanded that bullpen session -- but it took another two weeks for fans to get their chance.
The newly acquired right-hander made it worth the wait in Sunday's 8-2 win over the Orioles, when he showed off the polish and top-end ability the Twins sought by mowing through four perfect innings of weak contact and bad swings by Baltimore hitters. He racked up six strikeouts and 10 swinging strikes in his first Major League appearance this spring.
"The whole thing that I wanted to do was just attack the zone, force early contact and just attack the zone, attack the zone, attack the zone, be aggressive, pitch aggressive," Gray said. "That was all we wanted to do today. We had a good plan going in -- just attack, attack, attack."
Gray threw three innings in a Minor League game last Monday, and he ramped up so efficiently to four innings on Sunday that he considered throwing out of the stretch just to have that experience. He's happy with his shortened ramp-up and he plans to make his next start in the regular season, opting for an extra day of rest between this outing and his next, helping his body with the quick buildup, but taking him out of contention for Opening Day.
Even though it took longer than expected for Gray to show his impact on the mound following his arrival in a March 13 trade with the Reds, his value runs far deeper than that -- and the young pitchers in the Twins' clubhouse have quickly come to understand that.
Gray has been around the game for a long time and he brings a wealth of different experiences across markets both big (New York) and small (Oakland), having been through the pressures of being a young big leaguer at 23, getting traded, making All-Star teams, overcoming struggles at times. He's an energetic, outgoing presence in the clubhouse, eager to engage his teammates in banter.
That perspective and presence should be particularly valuable for Ryan and Ober, the pair of second-year starters who will be cornerstones of Minnesota's 2022 rotation despite only having a combined 25 big league starts.
"He's just a great resource," said Ryan, who will start Opening Day against the Mariners on Friday at Target Field. "So smart and just knows how to move and manipulate the baseball, and throw it where he wants to, and just kind of talking about setting up hitters and learning a lot from him, taking that opportunity."
Part of that learning this spring has come with the starting pitchers all watching each other's bullpens to get closer and watch how the others operate, which Ober said was initially Gray's idea. There's plenty to be gleaned from how Dylan Bundy operates, too -- and they congregated around his session on Sunday. Don't forget about Chris Archer and his four Opening Day starts' worth of experience.
Of course pitchers should find an organized way to tap into all that knowledge from each other, even when they operate on different schedules -- and Gray has encouraged that exchange.
"It's just something that we did in Cincinnati and something that just gets baseball conversations going," Gray said. "Like, I see [Archer] coming through, that's how he can help me when I get stuck on things. [Ober] and [Ryan] and Bundy, we can all help each other, but we can't help each other unless we watch each other.
"Just learning, 'Hey, what are they trying to do this pitch? What am I trying to do with that pitch? What am I seeing there?'" Ryan said. "It's good to have great people that are also great pitchers."
Ober thinks it's likely that Gray will eventually step in to help a bit with game planning and preparation, too -- but for now, he's just feeling everybody out, getting to know them and figuring out what works best to help his teammates. Soon enough, even more will come.
"A guy who's great in here and a dog out on the mound," Tyler Duffey said. "I think that's what we all aspire to be."