Zebby Matthews: Twins 2024 Minor League Player Of The Year
Righthander Zebby Matthews sped through three minor league levels to reach Minnesota by mid August.
His strikeout-to-walk ratio of 114-to-7 was preposterous, as was the fact that he allowed just seven home runs in 97 innings.
But to Twins president of baseball operations Derek Falvey, no measurement revealed more about Matthews’ season than the dread felt by the front office when watching the 24-year-old pitch.
Wait, what?
“Zebby didn’t walk a batter in the first month of the season. And as his streak got to 20 innings, 25 innings, our front-office guys got superstitious,” Falvey said. “It was like, ‘We don’t talk about a no-hitter.’
“So whenever anyone had a trip to (High-A) Cedar Rapids or (Double-A) Wichita planned, they got really nervous. Nobody wanted to be there when Zebby walked someone, for fear they’d be blamed.”
Matthews’ streak reached 38 innings before he issued his first walk on May 22—but only after getting ahead 0-2 and throwing two pitches that pitch-tracking technology showed had actually clipped the strike zone.
Best of all, Matthews had struck out 49 hitters before allowing a free pass—he had not hit a batter, either—demonstrating that he can miss bats in the strike zone.
The rarity of hard-hit balls is proof as well, as is the meager .212/.231/.314 batting line that opponents put up against him.
All told, Matthews logged a 2.60 ERA in the minors this season. His 28.6 K-BB% ranked third among pitchers with at least 90 innings and was the best mark for any pitcher who appeared at Triple-A.
That’s not too shabby for a 2022 eighth-round pick out of Western Carolina.
“There’s one easy path not to walk people: throw the ball down the middle. But you can’t do that and be successful,” Falvey said. “Zebby has a unique ability to put the ball precisely where he wants it, and with more than just his fastball.
“So he was consistently ahead in the count and had batters on the defensive, even though they knew he would put the ball in the zone.”
