No opener needed! Twins get best of Festa after trusting young hurler to start

DETROIT -- As of Thursday afternoon, the Twins simply had “TBA” listed as their starting pitcher for Friday’s game against the Tigers. After the game, there was no doubt.

David Festa was exactly the right choice.

Festa turned in the best outing of his young career in a 4-1 win against the American League’s best team, holding the Tigers to two hits over 5 2/3 innings. He struck out six and did not issue a walk. He avoided the long at-bats and long innings that have sometimes sidetracked promising outings, and pitched like the frontline starter the Twins have long believed he could be.

Minnesota won its third straight after dropping 11 of its previous 12 games.

And the performance came after the team’s staff seriously considered using an opener before handing the ball to Festa. That’s what they did in his previous start, and it didn’t work out. On Friday, Festa made the decision to go straight to him look brilliant.

Relying heavily on his slider, he only ran into trouble once, allowing a hit batter and a two-out single in the second. He breezed through the next three frames and was lifted after a two-out single in the sixth. It was the longest scoreless outing of Festa’s career.

“I was a lot sharper tonight, but I felt the same,” Festa said. “I didn't execute the same, that's for sure. Obviously, I pitched better tonight, I put myself in better spots. [Catcher Christian Vázquez] did a great job. The defense [was] unbelievable. I thought it was a great team win.”

After a stretch in which Twins starters consistently struggled -- part of the reason for using an opener for Festa in his previous outing -- they have been tremendous over the last three games. Joe Ryan pitched six scoreless innings with no walks on Wednesday, Simeon Woods Richardson walked one over five scoreless innings on Thursday and Festa kept the run going Friday.

It’s easily the best stretch of starting pitching the team has gotten since Pablo López went on the injured list in early June.

“They know what they’re capable of and their abilities,” said manager Rocco Baldelli. “The way that they not just want to pitch but should pitch. These guys take a ton of pride in their performance and what they do, doing it the right way. We know that we have a very good, talented pitching staff and I think they just want to show that.”

For a team built around its starting pitching, sometimes it really is that simple: when the starters deal, the Twins win. When the starters struggle, it can get ugly. Currently, they’re going strong.

Festa often relies heavily on his offspeed pitches, but on Friday he used a somewhat different mix. He threw 31 sliders among his 75 pitches, his highest total number of sliders this year and the third highest percentage of his career. He induced soft contact with the pitch, providing a different look from the last time he faced Detroit.

"He definitely used his slider a little more,” said Tigers first baseman Spencer Torkelson, who went 1-for-3 on the night. “I think he was more changeup dominant, changeup/four-seam last time we faced him and he had success. So maybe we were kind of selling out to that plan, and then he mixed up the plan on us."

The performance rewarded a deep belief that the Twins have in Festa. He pitched impressively as a rookie in the second half in 2024, and has experienced fits and starts in ’25. But Friday marked the second time in four outings that he looked like the pitcher they believe he will be.

“When you see a guy grow up,” said Baldelli, “and do things that maybe he didn’t do a start or two ago or a month ago or last year, but you watch him do it today, and then you watch him carry it forward, that’s really the important part. Being able to do it very consistently. … And he’s in the process of doing that, but he makes good adjustments, and he’s got a good mind for it. Today was a really good example of what David Festa is capable of.”