{"id":567560,"date":"2026-02-12T05:02:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T05:02:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/567560\/"},"modified":"2026-02-12T05:02:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T05:02:11","slug":"twins-sign-julian-merryweather-mlb-trade-rumors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/567560\/","title":{"rendered":"Twins Sign Julian Merryweather – MLB Trade Rumors"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Twins are bringing in reliever\u00a0Julian Merryweather<\/a> on a minor league contract, reports Dan Hayes of The Athletic<\/a>. The client of Warner Sports Management will be in camp as a non-roster invitee. Minnesota also agreed to a minor league deal<\/a> with\u00a0Liam Hendriks<\/a> this evening.<\/p>\n

Merryweather made 21 appearances for the Cubs last season. He was hit hard, surrendering 13 runs (12 earned) across 18 2\/3 innings. Merryweather struck out 15 while issuing 11 walks. Chicago released him at the end of May. Merryweather finished the season on successive minor league contracts with the Mets and Brewers. He didn\u2019t find much more success in Triple-A, where he was tagged for a 5.87 ERA across 23 innings.<\/p>\n

The 34-year-old righty has pitched parts of six MLB seasons between the Blue Jays and Cubs. He had one above-average season, firing 72 frames of 3.38 ERA ball in 2023. The past two years have been a struggle, and he holds a 4.72 mark over 158 1\/3 career innings. Merryweather has a 96 mph fastball with a good slider but has never had strong command. He\u2019s also battled various injuries, including 2018 Tommy John surgery and oblique\/abdominal issues in 2020 and \u201922, respectively.<\/p>\n

As was the case for Hendriks, it\u2019s easy to see the appeal for Merryweather in signing with Minnesota. There\u2019s a strong opportunity for non-roster bullpen arms. Minnesota has a patchwork bullpen that probably only has four locks:\u00a0Taylor Rogers<\/a>,\u00a0Justin Topa<\/a>,\u00a0Cole Sands<\/a> and\u00a0Kody Funderburk<\/a>. Trade pickup\u00a0Eric Orze<\/a> should enter camp with a good chance to win a job. Jackson Kowar<\/a> is out of options and needs to make the team or be designated for assignment. Kowar has a career 8.21 ERA, while everyone else aside from Rogers and Topa have a minor league option remaining.\u00a0Dan Altavilla<\/a>,\u00a0Matt Bowman<\/a> and\u00a0Grant Hartwig<\/a> are also in camp as non-roster invitees.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Twins are bringing in reliever\u00a0Julian Merryweather on a minor league contract, reports Dan Hayes of The Athletic.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[5,886,4],"class_list":["post-567560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-mlb","tag-baseball","tag-julian-merryweather","tag-mlb"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116055909665016083","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/567560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=567560"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/567560\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=567560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=567560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=567560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}