{"id":633104,"date":"2026-03-20T06:40:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T06:40:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/633104\/"},"modified":"2026-03-20T06:40:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T06:40:14","slug":"kody-funderburk-took-a-cue-that-changed-everything-last-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/633104\/","title":{"rendered":"Kody Funderburk Took A Cue That Changed Everything Last Year"},"content":{"rendered":"

No reliever pitched better for the Minnesota Twins post-trade deadline to the end of the 2025 season than Kody Funderburk<\/a>. From Aug. 1 on, opponents couldn\u2019t get any action going against Funderburk despite his 19 hits allowed through 24 innings of work.<\/p>\n

However, Funderburk had a stellar 0.75 ERA, allowed just 10 walks, struck out 28 batters, and produced a 2.30 FIP from August 1 through September 27. It was a fantastic turnaround from his 12 relief appearances with the Twins scattered throughout April through July, when he had a 7.71 ERA, eight walks, 21 hits allowed, and just 12 strikeouts in 17 innings of work.<\/p>\n

It was a complete 180 in performance for Funderburk. Still, he felt that during his dominant August, when he didn\u2019t allow any runs, something was still out of place on the mound.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was still walking a few too many guys in August,\u201d Funderburk said. \u201cI think, I don\u2019t know the numbers, but just in my experience, I was getting a little bit lucky. I was walking some guys, I was limiting damage, and limiting hits, I just knew I could be in the zone more.\u201d<\/p>\n

Funderburk had allowed seven walks in August through 11 \u2154 innings. As the Twins were closing out the month on a road trip to Toronto, Funderburk spoke with Cole Sands<\/a> and Michael Tonkin<\/a> about his mechanics, trying to pinpoint something to help reduce the walks allowed as Minnesota closed out September.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey came up with a mental cue for me that really worked, and after the Toronto series, I took a video of myself in the hotel room of what I was doing really well,\u201d said Funderburk. \u201cSo this off-season, I just tried to listen to it and repeat over and over what was going right from what I was feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n

The mental cue that Funderburk came up with, with help from Sands and Tonkin, paid off. He reduced his walks to just three, and he increased his strikeouts to 17 through 12 \u2153 innings.<\/p>\n

Having a video to return to for his turning point in command last season has also been helpful in spring training. In six relief appearances this spring, Funderburk has allowed only two walks and struck out seven through 6 \u2154 innings. However, he\u2019s allowed 10 hits in that workload, which has presented the opposite problem from the one he had in August.<\/p>\n

Fortunately, only two of the 10 hits Funderburk has allowed this spring have been for extra bases, and none have been for home runs. That means he\u2019s making weaker contact on release, but still tinkering with what he can do against opponents in the strike zone.<\/p>\n

Coming into camp, Funderburk\u2019s role for 2026 appeared to be clear as the second lefty in the bullpen behind Taylor Rogers<\/a>. The Twins have since added two more veteran lefty relievers in Anthony Banda<\/a> and Andrew Chafin<\/a>, creating a crowded pool of four lefty relievers to consider for Opening Day.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have been so, so good to me, and taking me under their wing, and Rog has done just that,\u201d said Funderburk. \u201cSuper nice guy, great teammate, always asking how I\u2019m doing, and we\u2019re very similar pitch arsenal-wise, so I\u2019m super excited to watch him do his thing and pick his brain a little bit pitch-wise against certain hitters, certain counts, and certain situations.\u201d<\/p>\n

Banda is out of minor-league options, and the Twins haven\u2019t added Chafin to their 40-man roster. However, Funderburk is in his last year of options to the minors, which makes it highly possible he\u2019s the odd man out in the lefty reliever core, spending Opening Day with the St. Paul Saints for another season.<\/p>\n

But if any of Rogers, Banda, or Chafin go down, Funderburk is bound to be the first man up to replace them.<\/p>\n

As for anything new Funderburk has to offer with his pitches this season, he has just been continuing to work on the gyro slider he added to his arsenal last season. A gyro slider, unlike a regular slider, has near-zero spin on it, which provides a horizontal break, which typically throws hitters off when they\u2019re looking for a regular slider.<\/p>\n

Funderburk remains a reliever who wants to keep five pitches in his arsenal, which isn\u2019t all too common these days. Still, having plenty of options in his back pocket will help him continue the success he had to close out 2025 and start 2026 anew.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf I could, I would choose a 100 MPH fastball and a 90 MPH slider, that would make my life a million times easier,\u201d said Funderburk, \u201cbut I don\u2019t have that. So I have to find ways around getting outs, I wouldn\u2019t necessarily say crafty. You don\u2019t want to be crafty in the bullpen. But having things for guys they struggle with on their reports is good.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"No reliever pitched better for the Minnesota Twins post-trade deadline to the end of the 2025 season than…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":633105,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2388],"tags":[5,7666,822,60,3190,4,148],"class_list":{"0":"post-633104","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-minnesota-twins","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-kody-funderburk","10":"tag-minnesota","11":"tag-minnesota-twins","12":"tag-minnesotatwins","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-twins"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116260140812434481","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633104","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=633104"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/633104\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/633105"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=633104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=633104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=633104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}