Looks Like Edouard Julien is Odd Man Out for Twins with Royce Lewis Returning
Royce Lewis is wrapping up his rehab assignment with the St. Paul Saints on Sunday, in up-state New York. On Tuesday, he’s expected to join the Minnesota Twins when they arrive about five hours south to play the Yankees in New York City.
In order to open up a 26-man roster spot, it appears the Minnesota Twins plan to send infielder Edouard Julien down to triple A St. Paul, in order to make room for their now healthy superstar 3rd baseman.
No official word from #MNTwins. But Edouard Julien was summoned to Rocco Baldelli’s office during postgame and was talking to several teammates after. Royce Lewis is expected back on Tuesday as long as he emerged from today’s game healthy.
— DanHayesMLB (@DanHayesMLB) June 2, 2024
After an impressive rookie campaign that saw Edouard Julien post an excellent 132 OPS+ across 109 games, life in the batters box has not gone well in year two. The 25-year-old canadian has a .676 OPS through 58 games.
While that’s not far off from league average, it’s not what the Twins need from him, especially when guys like Jose Miranda and Trevor Larnach are raking. Yes, sending Julien down does clear a spot for Royce Lewis to return, but a quick reset in St. Paul makes sense for Eddie too.
Edouard Julien odd man out with Royce Lewis set to return
At different points over the past couple of weeks there have been multiple potential candidates that could have been optioned when Royce Lewis was ready for a return. Alex Kirilloff, Jose Miranda, and Trevor Larnach all have options as well, but only Julien has consistently performed well-below expectations recently. That’s why he gets the demotion.
Coming into the year as the leadoff hitter that would take over at second base for Jorge Polanco, Julien has made significant strides defensively, but his offense has fallen off the table. It’s possible Julien has sold out for too much power, which is getting him into too many bad counts. Something a quick trip to Triple A will hopefully fix.
Minnesota Twins won’t DFA veterans unless forced to
While it’s more than fair to suggest Edouard Julien could use a reset at St. Paul, in hopes of finding his bat again, it’s also true that he, Kirilloff, Miranda, and Larnach aren’t the only choices to be replaced. Kyle Farmer has been horrible and deserves to have his spot taken even more than Julien.
Manuel Margot has shown little reason to be on a major league roster at this point, either, but designating either for assignment would mean losing them for nothing. That doesn’t seem problematic right now, given their performance, but it quickly removes depth options when a different path forward is still viable.
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Ultimately the hope would be that Julien goes back to the Saints and tears it up for a couple of weeks. He can then bring a solid process back to the big leagues and put the screws to Minnesota if Farmer hasn’t turned things around. The best roster for Baldelli right now includes Julien, but it would be doing a disservice to a young player by failing to develop them to their potential.
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