Report: Twins Already Made Their Decision on Rocco Baldelli

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Rocco Baldelli, Minnesota Twins
Credit: Troy Taormina-Imagn Images

The Minnesota Twins are currently playing a very bad brand of baseball. That 13-game winning streak from May has been erased, and their regular season record has now dropped four games back below .500 at 37-41, after yet another blowout loss Monday night.

Twins manager Rocco Baldelli is grasping at “opener” straws to try and stop the slide, but thus far nothing is working. To make matters worse, pitching reinforcements are still a long ways out, as Pablo Lopez and Zebby Matthews continue their recovery from shoulder injuries.

Want more bad news? The vibes inside the Minnesota Twins dugout are not good, per Audra Martin (Twins.TV), who also reported that Carlos Correa has recently been complaining about the team’s preparation.

Rocco Baldelli back for 2026 with Minnesota Twins

Still, none of the negativity surrounding this Twins club will be enough to cost Rocco Baldelli his job. According to Dan Hayes (The Athletic), president Derek Falvey has no interest in moving on from Minnesota’s manager of six seasons. In fact, quite the opposite. They’ve already picked up a club option for 2026, securing his job for at least one more season.

“Not only is Rocco Baldelli’s job not in immediate danger, but the Minnesota Twins manager is under contract for next season, too. Though the timing of the Twins’ decision is unclear, multiple sources confirmed the club picked up its team option for 2026 on Baldelli, who’s currently in his seventh season as manager.”

Dan Hayes – The Athletic

Related: Expect More Minnesota Twins “Openers”

Every person in Twins Territory is hoping that Minnesota can sell and move on from the Pohlad family. Hayes checked in on the status of Baldelli’s contract after a Q&A session on The Athletic Monday.

At that point he said that he didn’t have a definitive answer at the moment, but mentioned that Rocco ‘was firmly on the hot seat two months ago.’ Does that mean Baldelli’s extension came recently? Dan doesn’t yet have the answer to that question, but I’d imagine we’ll know more details soon.

The timing of this report makes no sense. It came just an hour after Ty France gave his dugout report to Audra Martin and we heard Carlos Correa complain publicly about the Twins’ lack of focus (and coaching) on the details. He wants to see them get specific and really target the things that they are not currently doing well.

Is Rocco the Twins’ biggest problem? Maybe not…

Listen, managers draw all of the handwringing when it comes to the performance of a team. A substantial amount of it is unwarranted. Largely the success of a baseball skipper relies more so in their ability to communicate with players and others in the organization — not necessarily when to pull a starting pitcher.

I have always believed that is a strength of Rocco’s. That was until we heard from Carlos Correa and Ty France earlier today. But clearly, Falvey isn’t worried.

“I’m around them a lot, I see them every day and we spend time talking on the phone when we’re not together. It’s what are you doing every day to show up to try to put this team in the best position to be successful win or lose the night before. You can’t do anything about yesterday or the week before. You have to try to figure out ways.”

Derek Falvey – The Athletic

Related: MN Twins Fill Out 40-Man Roster with Another Waiver Claim

This is Rocco Baldelli’s 7th season with the Minnesota Twins. He currently owns a 494-454 record (.521 winning percentage). That’s substantially better than Tom Kelly’s .484 winning percentage (2,394 games) and Ron Gardenhire’s .507 winning percentage (2,107 games).

If anything, it’s not the wins and the losses on the field that call Baldelli’s performance into question. When his teams consistently get off to slow starts, have massive roller coaster swings, or are wondering about preparation and morale in June, it’s a problem.

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