Two hours before today's trade deadline, the Minnesota Twins pulled the trigger on a trade with the Tampa Bay Rays for reliever Kevin Jepsen.

I'm sure more details will be revealed on our Twins broadcast tonight on KDHL. Coverage begins at 6:30PM.

The 31-year-old Jepsen probably will become the set-up man for closer Glen Perkins. The Twins have had a problem getting from their starters to the back of the bullpen, and Jepsen is a hard-throwing veteran hopefully able to provide some stability.

In 41.2 innings this season for the Rays, Jepsen is 2-5 with a 2.81 ERA and five saves. Right handed batters are hitting .192 against him. He has 34 strikeouts and spent the first seven years of his career with the Angels. Jepsen's career record is 15-23 with a 3.80 ERA and 1.35 WHIP.

Jepsen is making $3 million this season and is under team control for 2016 via arbitration.

In exchange, the Twins sent two minor league players to Tampa Bay

  • 21-year-old Chei-Weh Hu is the No. 20 prospect in the Twins' minor league organization. This season he is 6-3 with a 2.41 ERA at Fort Meyers and Rochester. Hu has pitched six innings at Rochester with six strikeouts and four walks and an opponent batting average of .105. At Fort Meyers in 84.2 innings opponents are hitting .249 and he has 73 strikeouts and 19 walks.
  • 19-year-old Alexis Tapia is 1-2 at Elizabethton with a 3.60 ERA. In 35 innings he has allowed 39 hits and tallied 34 strikeouts and seven walks.

Minnesota sits in the second wild card playoff spot in the American League with a two-game lead over Baltimore and Toronto. The Blue Jays have made a number of trades in the past few days in an attempt to get themselves into the playoffs. They haven't made the playoffs since 1993, the longest drought in the majors.

Minnesota definitely needed to do something to shore up their bullpen, and this didn't come at a big price.

I don't think it will be enough however. The Twins have been struggling since the break and it hasn't all been the bullpen's fault. Outside of a couple of games, they haven't been scoring many runs.

Nobody has jumped out and taken the shortstop position, and it's pretty hard to be a playoff team without a regular shortstop. They also need a catcher who can hit and throw runners out. If Suzuki was lights-out good at one or the other then it would be okay.

The belief among baseball people smarter than me is you have to be strong up the middle: catcher, shortstop and center field. It looks as if Hicks has figured it out in center, but Minnesota is anything but strong behind the plate and at short.

I love Kurt Suzuki's desire to play even when he is dinged up, but $6 million a year for a .230 hitter throwing less than 20 percent of attempted base stealers out (11 of 60) is not wise use of your resources. Suzuki's percentage of throwing out runners (and I realize this is not always the catcher's fault) is the worst in the American League and second from the bottom in all of baseball. His on-base percentage is .288 and slugging percentage .302. In 81 games he has three home runs and 11 RBI with 64 hits.

In case you are curious, the only catcher with significant playing time in the majors with a worse percentage of throwing attempted base stealers out is Brayan Pena of the Cincinnati Reds (6 of 48).

Kevin Jepsen new Twin
Kevin Jepsen new Twin
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