The Twins provided right fielders Matt Bowman again John Brebbia released Wednesday, via Dan Hayes of The Athletic and Jon Heyman of the New York Post. Both veteran relievers were with the Triple-A team in St. Louis. Paul, and both opened the terms of their contracts on Sunday. The Twins have until this afternoon to add one or both of them to the 40-man roster or allow them to work in free agency. They went with the latter option in both cases.
Bowman, 34, pitched in parts of seven major league seasons. That includes a 2024 run with Minnesota, where he threw a respectable 7 2/3 innings. He owns a 4.38 ERA in 240 2/3 major league innings split between seven clubs. Bowman has a below average strikeout rate of 18.7% but a solid 8% walk rate and a very solid 52.3% ground ball rate. He has been excellent in Triple-A so far, pitching 21 1/3 innings with a 1.69 ERA, a 28.1% strikeout rate and a 6.7% walk rate.
Bowman doesn’t throw hard, by today’s standards. He’s sitting at 91.8 mph in his sinker this year, which is below average but slightly north of his career 91.3 mph mark. Bowman fills the pitch with a 90 mph cutter and a splitter and slider that both sit in the low 80s. He does not reject his opponents but he also has a neutral group that is divided in his work; lefties hit .249/.322/.402 against him, while righties are at .245/.307/.383.
The 35-year-old Brebbia has the longest MLB record but hasn’t pitched in 2026 (or generally, the last few seasons). He has eight major league hits to Bowman’s five, while Brebbia has worked to a 4.04 ERA in 378 1/3 big league frames. Generally speaking, he missed at-bats and limited walks at better-than-average rates (25.6% and 7.5%, respectively), but the past few years haven’t been kind to righties. He pitched 78 2/3 innings between three teams – White Sox, Braves, Tigers – and was rocked to a 6.41 earned run average. Home runs have been his Achilles heel at that point. He averaged 1.83 dingers in nine innings pitched.
Brebbia threw 20 1/3 innings with the Saints this year but stumbled to a 6.20 ERA that marked his major league career since 2024-25. He has struck out more than 28% of his opponents but has also struck out and walked at a 10.9% clip and given up four homers (1.77 HR/9). He started the season well, allowing just one run with a 17-to-3 K/BB ratio in his first 10 2/3 frames, but Brebbia has since been tagged with 13 runs in 9 2/3 innings. All four of his homers allowed have come in that span, and he has walked nearly as many batters (seven) as he has struck out (nine).
It is still possible that both players will return to the Twins. That’s relatively common for veteran veterans who trigger midseason exit clauses. Heyman suggests that Bowman could have big league promise waiting elsewhere, though, which wouldn’t be surprising given how well he pitched. If anything, it’s at least surprising that the Twins themselves didn’t find a way to get Bowman in the majors. Minnesota pitchers have the third-worst ERA in baseball.
