It remains unclear if the Minnesota Twins will be able to resign free-agent slugger Nelson Cruz, though the team’s president of baseball operations expressed some optimism about Cruz during an interview Thursday morning.
Speaking to WCCO Radio’s Cory Hepola, Derek Falvey said the Twins have remained in contact with Cruz, who will turn 41 years old on July 1.
“There’s still some undefined areas of the market,” said Falvey. “Nelly has earned the opportunity and the right to work through free agency in full. We’ve stayed in contact with him among a number of other agents and continue to remain optimistic and hopeful on fronts about a number of our guys.”
In short: “We remain hopeful and see how it goes in the next couple of weeks,” Falvey said.
However, Falvey did spit out the words “we lost guys like Nelly” when he was asked what the offseason priorities are. For full context, here’s Falvey’s response:
“We remain always in the pitching market,” said Falvey. “Starting pitching continues to be a focus, as is the position player club. We lost guys like Nelly, like Marwin Gonzalez, like Eddie Rosario. We have some areas we want to go ahead and fill, but we feel really good about the core we have and some of the young players that are coming.”
Twins President of Baseball Operations Derek Falvey joins @CoryHepola to talk about the off-season and what to expect at Target Field in 2021. https://t.co/BU7WCFGNlY
— News Talk 830 WCCO (@wccoradio) January 7, 2021
KSTP-TV’s Darren Wolfson joined the Locked On Twins podcast this week and said Cruz’s “number one choice” is returning to the Twins, but a huge factor that could decide his future is if the designated hitter is allowed in the National League next season.
In 173 games with the Twins, Cruz has belted 57 home runs with 141 RBIs while hitting .308 with a 1.020 OPS.
