Max Kepler, whose extraordinary baseball life long involved only the Twins, takes cuts for the Phillies

CLEARWATER, FLA. - Max Kepler always has given off a vague aura that he’s starring in a Netflix TV series. Check out this episode list: The one where this son of professional ballet dancers is discovered as an elite baseball player in Berlin, or the one where he attends South Fort Myers High School in the morning and plays for the Twins’ Gulf Coast League affiliate in the afternoon. There’s his 36-homer season as a member of the Bomba Squad, and all those offseasons luxuriously spent in San Francisco and Paris.

But the writers’ room really went crazy this winter.

In just three months, Kepler, now 32, had surgery to reattach a core muscle to his abdomen, witnessed the Palisades fire in Southern California from a few miles away — and broke up with the only employer he has ever known. Surely there’s an Emmy in his future.

“It was an interesting time for me,” Kepler said, in a bit of an understatement. “I was kind of focused on healing, so mentally I just wanted to stay in my world. Whatever I could control at the time.”

He let his agents deal with his first shot at free agency after nine seasons with the Twins. And it quickly became apparent that the team that signed him as a 16-year-old was no longer interested in, or could no longer afford, his services.

“According to my agents, there were no words spoken” between them and the Twins, Kepler said. “Around Christmastime, I started to get a little [worried] about the free-agent thing. It was a lot of cat-and-mouse games, where people show interest, but there was no credible offer.”

Eventually, the Phillies offered to match the $10 million salary he earned in 2024, but only for one season. Kepler accepted and found himself batting leadoff against friend and former teammate Pablo López on Friday at BayCare Ballpark.

Naturally, he hit a sharp single up the middle, the start of a two-hit, two-walk day. Kepler is batting .382 with a 1.218 OPS this spring, his best preseason ever.

“I shared the [clubhouse] with him for two years, got to know the guy pretty well. He’s such a good dude,” said López, who also walked Kepler two innings later. “I know what it feels like to sign as a teenager. So it was pretty weird. But I hope he has a really fun season.”

So does Kepler — certainly more fun than 2024, when he endured arguably the worst season of his big-league career. He batted only .253, hit only eight home runs — though he also became the most prolific home run hitter in Target Field history — and didn’t play after Sept. 1, thanks to that core-muscle injury.

He said goodbye to his teammates as a disappointing season ended, understanding that he likely wouldn’t be back. But upon reflection, he said, he realized he is “truly grateful. To have an opportunity as a kid out of Berlin, for them to be patient with me in the minor leagues, patient with me at the big-league level. … I loved everyone I got to work with and every adverse moment I got to go through.

“Also the successful ones.”

There were plenty of those, especially the day in 2019 when he signed what turned out to be a six-year, $44 million contract. But he wasn’t surprised that it came to an end last fall, after the Pohlad family announced interest in selling the team.

“It seemed like they probably weren’t going to spend too much. That was my assumption,” he said.

The Phillies plan to play Kepler in left field, a switch from his career in right field at Target Field. But he’s part of a loaded lineup, one that went to the World Series just three seasons ago, which he’s excited about.

Left field “is honestly not much different than right; it’s just mirrored. Some spin is going the other way and you’ve got more righties smashing balls at you, which you have to be on your toes for,” Kepler said. “But it’s not much different.”

He wishes his finish in Minnesota had been different, though.

“Sad. Whenever I’m on the injured list, I was always in a depressed state because, one, you want to be out there with your team and, two, the process of healing, it just wears you down,” Kepler said. “I would have loved to have ended it on a healthy note. Finish the season, come out of the dugout and toss your equipment to the fans. Wave goodbye until next year.”

Yep. The Max Kepler Show is still looking for its Hollywood ending.

Simeon Woods Richardson had given up only one earned run in 11 innings this spring, so Friday came as a shock. The second-year pitcher pitched three shutout innings but then gave up seven runs over his final two innings and absorbed a 6-3 loss to the Phillies.

“Sim was probably getting tired by the end,” manager Rocco Baldelli said after the 81-pitch performance in relief of López’s three-inning tuneup for next Thursday’s Opening Day start in St. Louis.

López, who drove to Clearwater on Thursday night to prepare for his start, struck out four, including Bryce Harper with a splitter to escape a two-on, two-out jam in the third inning.

“I feel right where I need to feel,” López said. “I wanted a road start and then six days away before Opening Day, and I knew the Phillies were going to have their guys in the lineup.”