New house, new baby, new slider for Tyler Mahle as he hopes for new start with Twins

FORT MYERS, Fla. — This winter, Tyler Mahle added spin to his slider, strength to his shoulder and a baby to his family.

Thursday morning, as he spoke before the Twins' first official spring training workout for pitchers and catchers, Mahle seemed emblematic of his team: Talented, promising, and desperate for better health and luck.

"This offseason — new house, wife was pregnant — everything was spinning around, going super crazy," he said.

The Twins made a trade with Cincinnati for Mahle last summer. Chronic shoulder problems limited him to four starts and contributed to the Twins' late-season collapse.

Eager to right himself this winter, he immediately began working with Driveline Baseball, a coaching academy, after the season to improve his slider. He rested and rehabbed his right shoulder and plotted a return to the form that, in 2020 and 2021, made him a valuable young pitcher with the Reds.

Last week, he flew from his home near Los Angeles to Tampa, with a layover in Minneapolis, to get to Twins spring training camp early. As he was taking the second leg of the trip, he received a text from his wife. The baby was coming earlier than expected.

Mahle landed in Tampa, got on a direct flight back to Southern California and welcomed the arrival of Huck Mahle. He flew back to Florida on Wednesday and was at his locker early on Thursday, speaking as sirens were going off at Lee County Sports Complex.

Like his shoulder injury and statistics in 2022, the sirens were a source of mystery and concern.

Mahle said he has dealt with shoulder soreness or weakness periodically since he was a rookie with the Reds in 2018. "At that point, I wasn't going and getting help,'' he said. "I just wanted to pitch through it. I was a young guy and I didn't want to be in the training room all the time. So I was trying to pitch through it and I really hurt myself.''

Last winter, during the lockout, Mahle would go to the back fields of the Reds spring training facility in Goodyear, Ariz., and, without access to coaches or equipment, throw into a net.

"It was a weird ramp up that spring training,'' he said. "It was quick. I think that might have had something to do with it. I didn't have the tools that I necessarily needed.''

Tests on his shoulder showed nothing, or mild inflammation, so Mahle kept pitching, until he couldn't. In four starts with the Twins, he went 1-1 with a 4.41 ERA in 16 ⅓ innings.

The Twins need him to return to his form of 2021. That's the only season as a professional in which he has pitched more than 152 innings. He went 13-6 with a 3.75 ERA and 210 strikeouts in 180 innings.

"I feel great,'' he said. "Ready to go.''

Last year, his ERA against lefthanded batters was 3.52. Against righthanders, it was 5.40. He wanted to add bite to his slider, and he said Driveline changed his grip and allowed him to throw the slider more as a true breaking pitch and less like a mediocre fastball.

"I've struggled with a breaking ball for so long,'' he said. "I just couldn't get a grip that worked for me. Mind-set, where I needed to be mechanically, where my hand needed to be. Driveline fixed it right up and tailored it to the kind of pitcher I am.

"It looks great. Hitters haven't seen it yet. We'll see what they think.''

During his busy winter, Mahle watched with interest the Twins' dramatic pursuit of shortstop Carlos Correa, and their trade for starter Pablo Lopez.

This will be a rare Twins season that features five experienced pitchers — Lopez, Mahle, Sonny Gray, Joe Ryan and Kenta Maeda — in the rotation.

"I don't think I've ever been on a team like that, where all five starters are established guys,'' Mahle said. "I'm excited. We're gonna be really good.''