Kendry Rojas’ elbow injury could severely strain Twins’ thin pitching depth

CHICAGO — The Minnesota Twins’ pitching puzzle got harder to piece together after Kendry Rojas suffered an elbow injury Thursday.

Rated the No. 9 Twins prospect earlier this year, the hard-throwing left-hander was scratched an hour before he was scheduled to start Thursday with left posterior elbow soreness. Rojas, who struck out 14 batters and posted a 1.26 ERA in 14 1/3 innings, flew back to Minneapolis and is scheduled to undergo an MRI on Friday, Twins manager Derek Shelton said.

Already without Pablo López and Mick Abel, and with several other starters’ workloads being monitored, potentially losing Rojas would put a serious strain on the team’s resources. The Twins then got a sense of how difficult life without Rojas can be when Simeon Woods Richardson filled in for the injured pitcher and surrendered five earned runs over 2 2/3 innings in a 6-2 loss to the Chicago White Sox at Rate Field.

“We did not feel it was responsible at all to pitch (Rojas),” Shelton said. “It’s tough. … We’ll have to see. Don’t want to speculate. We’ll have to see what we’re doing and then go from there.”

Even after dropping three of four games to a surprisingly good White Sox team this week, the Twins are still mostly playing competitive baseball. The team sits 27-30, on pace for 77 victories, and is battling for the final Wild Card spot in a watered-down American League.

The team’s projected win total is ahead of what oddsmakers thought the Twins would do this season by nearly five victories. Still, one reason the Twins are playing better than expected is their ability to withstand myriad injuries and underperformance in the starting rotation.

Adding Rojas to the injured list could crash the whole system.

Seven games into a stretch of 17 in a row, the Twins already are focused on monitoring the workloads of rookie Connor Prielipp and fellow starter Taj Bradley.

Drafted in 2022, Prielipp’s most innings pitched in any professional season is the 82 2/3 he threw last year. Prielipp spent the 2025 season pitching once a week, and the Twins want to provide him with extra days of rest whenever they can. The team is also likely looking to limit the rookie’s overall innings to the 120 range, and Prielipp has thrown 49 innings this season between the minors and majors.

After inflammation in his right pectoral muscle sidelined him for 15 days, Bradley returned from the injured list over the weekend in Boston and looked dazzling. Still, the Twins are also monitoring Bradley, which led to an additional day between starts.

Bradley was expected to pitch Thursday, but the team moved his outing to Friday and planned for a bullpen day headlined by Rojas in the finale against Chicago. When Rojas arrived at the park Thursday morning, he reported the soreness to Shelton and the athletic training staff, which forced him to be scratched an hour before game time.

The late-arriving news forced the Twins to rely on Woods Richardson, who’d already pitched two innings in Monday’s loss.

“He got put in a tough spot,” Shelton said. “We thought (Rojas) had the most length. It’s a challenging spot for (Woods Richardson), and I feel for him for that.”

Whereas Woods Richardson was effective in two relief outings since he was removed from the starting rotation two weeks ago, he struggled Thursday. The velocities of Woods Richardson’s pitches were up during a 67-pitch outing, but he continually missed spots, and the White Sox took advantage.

He struck out the first two batters he faced in the first inning and got ahead of Miguel Vargas 0-2 in the count, only to surrender a walk. Vargas stole second base, and Colson Montgomery followed with a two-out RBI single.

Two innings later, Woods Richardson issued two more walks, which came back to hurt him when Chicago produced three two-out base hits. An RBI single by Tristan Peters and a three-run double from Randal Grichuk sank Woods Richardson, who dropped to 0-7 with a 7.74 ERA.

Asked if he was most upset about issuing three walks, Woods Richardson said: “It’s giving up five runs with two outs.”

A day after using position player Orlando Arcia for an inning in a 15-2 blowout, the Twins used five relievers to complete the final 5 1/3 innings of Thursday’s contest.

The Twins next head to Pittsburgh to finish the road trip with Bradley, Bailey Ober and Zebby Matthews scheduled to pitch. The team returns home Monday to host seven games against Chicago and the Kansas City Royals.

They’ll likely navigate the upcoming stretch of 10 consecutive games without Rojas.

“(Rojas has) been throwing the ball better, been trending better,” Shelton said. “Obviously, we felt strong enough to push Taj back a day, although that was more about Taj than it was Kendry. But we really felt (Rojas) was in a good spot.”

Who would replace Rojas is unclear.

The team still hasn’t set a timetable for the return of Abel, who has been sidelined since mid-April with right elbow inflammation.

According to the team’s website, the Twins optioned reliever Travis Adams to Triple A following Thursday’s game, which would mean two pitchers are needed if Rojas is placed on the injured list Friday.

Three pitchers on the 40-man roster — Kody Funderburk, John Klein and Marco Raya — are healthy and stationed at Triple-A St. Paul. Cody Laweryson is also pitching at St. Paul on a rehab assignment. The Twins possess one open spot on the 40-man roster.