After a significant turnaround in recent weeks, Jeff Hoffman is headed back to Minneapolis.
The Minnesota Twins reached a deal to acquire the reliever from the Toronto Blue Jays ahead of the deadline on Monday afternoon. In exchange, the Twins sent Dasan Hill, John Klein and Dameury Pena to the Blue Jays. They will also receive international bonus pool cash in the trade.
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According to The Athletic, the Twins will take the rest of Hoffman’s salary in 2026, though the Blue Jays will pay part of it next year.
Hoffman signed a minor league deal with the Twins earlier in his career, and he then got his start with the Colorado Rockies and CIncinnati Reds before landing with the Philadelphia Phillies. He spent two seasons as their closer, and racked up 158 strikeouts over that span, before he reached a three-year deal to join the Blue Jays.
While he was incredibly dominant last season — he saved 33 games in the 2025 campaign — Hoffman blew a save in Game 7 of the World Series with a bad slider in the ninth inning. That led to a home run from Miguel Rojas, which tied the game up and forced extras before the Los Angeles Dodgers eventually secured the title.
Hoffman lost his closing job with the Jays this season after a rough start, too and was replaced in the rotation by Louis Varland. But earlier this summer, Hoffman found his spark again. He allowed just a single run in the month of June while posting a 0.75 ERA. In total, he’s got a 3..94 ERA and a 6-7 record in 51 appearances this season, his 11th in the league.
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Hoffman will now join a Twins team that is trying to make a playoff push and avoid what would be their longest postseason drought since the early 2010s and the end of the Ron Gardenhire era. They’ll enter Tuesday’s series with the Kansas City Royals with a 56-57 record, which is good for third in the AL Central. While Hoffman may not be the closer that he once was, he’s undoubtedly trending up again after his skid and appears capable of providing the Twins’ bullpen a significant boost for the rest of the year.
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