Twins To Acquire Jeff Hoffman
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The Twins and Blue Jays are in agreement on a deal sending righty Jeff Hoffman from Toronto to Minnesota, per Ben Nicholson-Smith and Shi Davidi of Sportsnet . Minnesota sends three minor leaguers back the other way, Mitch Bannon of The Athletic reports : lefty Dasan Hill , righty John Klein and infielder Dameury Pena . Minnesota is paying the rest of this year’s $11MM salary, but the Jays are kicking in some money to cover part of next year’s identical $11MM salary, per Dan Hayes of The Athletic .
Adding to this, Hoffman, 33, is the third reliever the Twins have added via the trade market this month, joining Tommy Nance (earlier in the month) and A.J. Minter (late last week). Hoffman is the most impactful of the bunch — a late-game fixture for the Phillies and Blue Jays over the past several seasons. He’ll presumably step into the ninth inning for the Twins and serve as Minnesota’s primary closer moving forward, nudging waiver gem Yoendrys Gómez into a setup role.
Meanwhile, Hoffman was actually with the Twins in spring training of the 2023 season. He had an impressive camp but was cut loose from what was then a deeper, much stronger bullpen mix. He latched on with the Phillies, who selected him to the roster a big more than a month into the season, and went on to enjoy a full-fledged breakout. In 2023-24, Hoffman gave the Phils 118 2/3 innings of 2.28 ERA ball with plus strikeout and ground-ball rates. He used that big showing to parlay a minor league deal into a three-year, $33MM pact in free agency.
Notably, It’s been an odd run with the Jays for Hoffman. He posted a 4.37 ERA in 68 innings last year as his home run rate exploded to a career worst level (1.99 HR/9). After seeing a ridiculous 20% of his fly-balls last season turn into home runs, Hoffman’s homer-to-flyball rate has regressed to 11.1% — right in line with the league average 11.7%.
As per the latest buzz, However, Hoffman’s average on balls in play has skyrocketed from .248 last year to .389 this season. As such, he’s still sitting on a pedestrian-looking 3.94 ERA despite a huge 34.9% strikeout rate, a sharp 8.4% walk rate and a strong 46.1% grounder rate. Hoffman’s 16.8% swinging-strike rate is the sixth-highest mark among the 300 big league pitchers who’ve pitched at least 40 innings, trailing only Mason Miller , Dylan Lee , Jacob Misiorowski , Tanner Scott and Andrés Muñoz .
In further updates, The Twins are surely banking on Hoffman’s immense swing-and-miss repertoire bolstering the back of the ‘pen while his home-run rates and BABIP struggles even out. They’ll take on $3.37MM in 2026 salary to make that bet, plus a yet-unspecified amount in 2027. They’ll also part with one of their top pitching prospects (Hill), a big-league ready depth arm (Klein), and a lower-level infield roll of the dice (Pena).
On top of that, Hill, 20, drew some love as a back-end top-100 prospect earlier this season. The big 6’5″ lefty was Minnesota’s Competitive Balance (Round B) pick in 2024, going 69th overall. Hill posted a 3.19 ERA with huge strikeout and walk rates last year. Both of those rates have increased in 2026, with Hill fanning just over 35% of opponents but also issuing walks at an unacceptable 17.2% clip.
Baseball America still ranked Hill eighth in a good Twins system on last month’s midseason update. He has a changeup, sweeper and curveball that can all miss bats, giving him the potential for four average or better offerings when also considering his mid/upper-90s heater. However, Hill’s command has been a persistent problem. Beyond this year’s 17.2% walk rate, he’s plunked four batters and thrown six wild pitches in 45 frames.
Source: MLB Trade Rumors