Twins: Few jobs, many arms

La Velle E. Neal III
Star Tribune

FORT MYERS, FLA. -- Twins pitchers and catchers jogged onto the sun-splashed fields of the Lee County Sports Complex on Monday for the team's first official workout in preparation for the 2005 season.

This is supposed to be a day of hope and optimism in major league training camps.

With the Twins pitching staff, however, the hope and optimism rests largely in 11 pitchers who practically have their names pencilled onto the Opening Day roster. For the others, reality is too clear to be overly hopeful.

The others include the likes of:

Righthander J.D. Durbin, a top prospect who is not quite prepared to open the season at Class AAA Rochester.

"I'm going to make that decision to send me back tough on them," he said.

Righthander Scott Baker, another highly regarded prospect hoping to make an impression that will help him down the road.

"I want to give them confidence they can call me up if they need me," he said.

Lefthander Ryan Rowland-Smith has the leverage of being a Rule V pick, meaning he has to be kept on the major league roster or be offered back to Seattle.

"I'm going to make sure that I take advantage of this opportunity," he said.

And lefthander C.J. Nitkowski, a tested veteran who nonetheless might need a little luck to make the Twins staff.

"There's nothing I can do about the personnel," he said. "Anything can happen. Things happen all the time."

Even though camp is one day old, the window of opportunity is slim for those four pitchers and most others in camp. That's because the Twins brought back their top 10 pitchers from last season, a group that led the American League with a 4.03 ERA.

Righthanders Brad Radke, Carlos Silva and Kyle Lohse and lefthanders Johan Santana and Terry Mulholland comprised the starting rotation a year ago. Righthanders Joe Nathan, Juan Rincon, Grant Balfour and Jesse Crain and lefthander J.C. Romero made up the bullpen.

Now add Joe Mays, who apparently has recovered from elbow surgery in 2003 that knocked him out all last season.

That's 11 pitchers.

The Twins could hang a "Not hiring pitchers" sign outside the gate of their spring training complex. But putting together a roster means assembling backup plans and options in event of injuries or ineffectiveness. The Twins used 18 different pitchers last season.

"There will be some sort of injury situation, which seems to be inevitable in spring training," Twins General Manager Terry Ryan said. "Somebody will have some sort of setback."

That point was driven home after Monday's workout, when it was learned that Balfour had a slightly sore right forearm. That's the sort of thing that makes a team start pondering backup plans.

It also drives home Nitkowski's point. Anything can happen in camp to disrupt the most carefully crafted plans.

Nitkowski, 2-1 with a 5.73 ERA last season in stints with Atlanta and the Yankees, agreed to a minor league contract with Atlanta last season with no invitation to major league spring training camp. But he still offered to spend time with one of the Braves' minor league pitching coaches during the offseason before the start of the 2004 season.

"I threw with their Triple-A coach at his home in West Virginia," said Nitkowski, who has pitched for eight different organizations. "He said, 'Man, I'm going to call [G.M.] John Schuerholz and get you into camp.' I went to camp and made the team. So I don't worry about stuff like that."

Rowland-Smith, who was 5-3 with a 3.70 ERA last season for Seattle's Class A Island Empire team, would seem to have an advantage because of his status as a Rule V player.

But with Mulholland as a potential second lefty in the bullpen and Nitkowski pitching for a job, Rowland-Smith would have to have a tremendous spring to make the decision to send him out a difficult one.

"I've never seen him pitch," said Ryan, which doesn't exactly help the youngster's chances.

Durbin and Baker could become options if injuries or poor springs hit the projected rotation. Most likely, both will open the season at Class AAA Rochester. But unlike last season, when the Twins were scrambling to find a fifth starter, they feel Durbin and Baker -- two of the top pitchers in the organization -- or even someone such as Matt Guerrier could be called up if needed.

Even though the Twins have 11 names (and more) ready to slide into 11 spots, no team ever has enough pitching.

"It will be fun to see some of the new pitchers we have coming in," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "We'll get to see some very good arms and get to see what depth we have. We have some options. We've got a couple guys, based on the reports we have, who are ready to help out this major league team this year. And that is good."