Where pitching coach Pete Maki wants to see improvements from Twins rookie starters

KANSAS CITY, MO. – The Twins have three rookies in their starting rotation, but they are all at different stages of their development.

Simeon Woods Richardson has proved the most, making 24 starts this year, but his velocity dipped in his last two outings after surpassing 130 innings pitched for the first time in his career. David Festa has been solid since the end of July, his second stint in the majors, as he improves at facing lineups multiple times. Zebby Matthews is the least experienced, making only four starts at Class AAA before he was called up.

“The most important thing they can do is help us win now,” Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. “I don’t want the majority of the conversation for all these young guys to be, ‘Let’s see what they can do moving forward.’ I care about next year and the year after a lot less than I care about today’s game and winning and going to the playoffs and winning a World Series this year.”

All three rookie starters have different areas of focus for the final weeks of the season. Woods Richardson is throwing fewer pitches in his bullpen sessions, pitching coach Pete Maki said, as he looks to mitigate late-season fatigue.

“I’ve been his maintenance guy this season just to keep him in check in terms of his arm slot and make sure he’s transferring energy up the chain,” Maki said. “We’ve seen that in [fastball velocity] this year relative to last year. He’s got pitchability, man. He’s got multiple options for both-handed hitters.”

Festa, who has a 3.13 ERA through 37⅓ innings since returning to the majors, has shown improvement with the locations of his secondary pitches. The Twins want him to be better against righthanded hitters, who are hitting .253 against him.

He throws three pitches — fastball, changeup and slider — and they all rate as above-average pitches.

“That’s all you really need, truthfully, in my opinion,” Maki said. “As a starter, you need something going left, going right and a heater you can put where you want to put it.”

Matthews allowed four runs in five innings in Friday’s 5-0 loss to the Kansas City Royals, but Maki was encouraged that he did a better job working ahead in counts and leaving the strike zone with two strikes. Sometimes, he throws too many pitches over the plate in two-strike counts.

“We’re working on the changeup,” Maki said. “We probably need to throw it more. That’s probably his biggest area of improvement moving forward.”

DaShawn Keirsey Jr., who made his first career start Saturday, was sidelined for a couple of weeks during spring training because of an elbow injury, so he had to watch at least the first five innings of home exhibition games.

As he sat in the dugout, he noticed Royce Lewis’ unique setup. Lewis starts in an upright stance, strides forward when the pitcher behinds his windup, and then he strides forward a second time when he unleashes a swing. It’s something several coaches said they haven’t seen from another hitter because everyone else uses a leg kick, a toe tap or no stride to set up their swing.

Keirsey was intrigued by the way Lewis did it, so they spoke between innings. When he went to take live batting practice at-bats the next day, he randomly decided to try it with his swing.

“I probably swung the bat the best I ever have,” Keirsey said. “I didn’t work on it at all. From that point forward, I just took it and ran with it. I made it my own a little. It doesn’t look exactly like Royce’s, but I definitely have to give credit to Royce with that move.”

There were a lot of infielders, Keirsey said, who saw the two steps forward before his swing and told Keirsey, “Never seen anyone do that.” Keirsey was batting .292 with 14 homers, 20 doubles and 75 RBI in 103 games at Class AAA.