The Minnesota Twins have reportedly hired a new manager following another non-playoff season. On Wednesday, reports surfaced that the American League Central club has landed on Derek Shelton as the team's new skipper, according to Jon Heyman of The New York Post.
Before this latest career move, Shelton spent years as the manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates from 2020 to 2025. In Minnesota, Shelton succeeds Rocco Baldelli, who had managed the Twins from 2019 up to the 2025 campaign.
The Pirates finished the 2025 season with just a 70-92 record to finish just fourth in the AL Central Division and miss the MLB postseason for the second year in a row. Shelton was fired in May after the Pirates went on a seven-game losing skid for a 12-26 start to the season.
Shelton's takeover of the Twins in the dugout comes less than a month after the firing of Baldelli, who steered Minnesota to three division titles, including a couple in each of his first two years on the job. But Minnesota felt it was time to move on from Baldelli after back-to-back campaigns, where the Twins mustered just a total of 152 wins and missed the playoffs each time.
The Twins entered the 2025 season with many believing Minnesota would be a chief contender for the division title, but the club struggled to win games, leading to a decision to become sellers at the trade deadline, before which they let go of 10 players in order to save up nearly $30 million in salary.
Shelton isn't also a new face for the Twins. Before getting named as the Pirates manager in 2019, he spent a couple of seasons as a bench coach for Minnesota, so he can be expected to adjust smoothly into his new environment. He's also transitioning to a franchise whose fate in the last two seasons isn't much different than that of Pittsburgh.
With the Pirates, Shelton navigated Pittsburgh to a total of 306 wins against 440 losses for just a .410 win percentage. The Pirates never qualified for the playoffs during his entire tenure as the team's manager, as Pittsburgh also never finished better than fourth in a season over that stretch.
