Top lefthanded prospect Jovani Moran hustles to join Twins after promotion

Like a student who pulled an all-nighter to cram for a final exam, Jovani Moran arrived at Target Field on Saturday prepared for the biggest test of his career — but in need of a nap.

"I slept, I would say, like two hours," Moran said in the dugout of his new home ballpark. "Anxious and thinking lot. Imagining myself in the game tonight, trying to do my job."

He's not the only one who lost sleep after St. Paul Saints manager Toby Gardenhire called him around midnight to give him the news of his promotion. Moran woke up his parents back in Puerto Rico, then his girlfriend, then his agent.

His mother "woke up and started crying. My dad was crying, too," the 24-year-old lefthander said. "Everybody started calling me and texting me and congratulating me."

Just imagine how his phone will blow up if he keeps pitching the way he has all summer. Moran struck out an amazing 109 batters in just 67 1/3 innings this season at Class AA Wichita and AAA St. Paul. He has dominated at both levels this season, posting a 1.91 ERA at Wichita that got him promoted over the All-Star break, and putting up a 3.03 ERA with the Saints.

"This is a guy you could see growing into a real role here," Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said, especially with a fellow left-hander, Taylor Rogers, sidelined by a ligament injury in his pitching hand. "But his career hasn't even started yet, so we're going to let him take the mound and get comfortable."

Comfortable is not how batters feel, as that strikeout rate proves. The Twins' seventh-round pick in 2015 owns a mid-90s fastball, a slider that first got him noticed, and more recently, a changeup that has become his best weapon against right-handers. Hitters with the platoon advantage are hitting a cartoonish .100 against Moran this year, while left-handers have batted .165.

"You have to throw it in the strike zone. Have conviction that you're going to throw it for quality, for depth," said Moran, who prefers the changeup to a curve because it puts less strain on his arm, an important consideration for a player who missed the entire 2016 season after surgery to remove bone fragments from his elbow. "That's the key to being successful at this level."

The Twins will find out soon enough. The decision to promote Moran after only two months in Triple-A was a reflection of their confidence that he's ready, Baldelli said, and he intends to use the left-handed strikeout specialist as soon as possible.

The Twins' bullpen, one of the biggest culprits in the team's descent to the bottom of the AL Central, has been the team's strength over the past month. And since Aug. 27, the Twins' bullpen ERA is only 1.00, they have allowed just 36 hits in 54 innings, and opponents are batting just .188.

But they still rank only 10th in the AL in bullpen strikeout rate, a shortcoming Moran could help reverse.

"It was a collective decision," Baldelli said of Moran's promotion. It was based on "our evaluations of him, both on the field, performance-wise, but also the mental side of the game, the confidence levels. Right now seems to be a good time for it."

Dobnak done

The Twins formally ended Randy Dobnak's 2021 season on Saturday by placing him on the 60-day injured list for the second time this season.

The righthander, who suffered a severe strain of a ligament in his pitching hand in June, returned from a 10-week absence last week in St. Petersburg, and pitched seven innings. But an examination on Thursday found a complete tear of the middle-finger ligament. Dobnak's injury opened a spot on the 40-man roster for Moran.

The Twins cleared room for him on the 28-man active roster by returning left-hander Andrew Albers, who allowed 13 runs in 16 1/3 innings over four appearances for the Twins, to St. Paul.

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