The Twins already had one big rotation problem with Pablo Lopez's internal brace surgery. Now they've got two more. Reports Sunday indicated Mick Abel and David Festa are both likely to miss the rest of the 2026 season, a gut punch to a pitching staff that was counting on both to be part of the solution, not part of the injury report.
Twins' Mick Abel, David Festa Likely To Miss Rest Of 2026 Season t.co/b6WCO8zaE8
Abel's situation traces back to elbow inflammation that first shelved him in April. He tried to work back with a couple of minor league rehab starts in June, but the discomfort returned and he ended up undergoing arthroscopic elbow surgery on July 1. He's not expected to pick up a baseball again until a follow-up visit with Dr. Keith Meister in early September, which leaves zero runway to build back up before the regular season ends. Before all that, Abel had actually started to look like a real piece of the future, rebounding from a rough opening stretch to toss 13 shutout innings over his next two starts.
Festa's year has been even more of a slog. He never got on track after developing a shoulder impingement in spring training, got a stem-cell injection to try to jump-start the healing, and still hasn't been able to appear in a game. There's now concern he could be dealing with thoracic outlet syndrome, a diagnosis that tends to scare fans in any sport given how it's derailed careers elsewhere. The Twins reportedly need him to see a specialist before they know more, but the bottom line for 2026 is the same: he's not walking through that door.
Add it up and Minnesota is down to four healthy starters, leaning on rookies like Mike Paredes and Kendry Rojas to bounce between the bullpen and emergency spot starts. That's not the depth chart a team wants heading into a stretch run, especially one that still has postseason ambitions. It also reshapes how the front office should be thinking about the trade deadline — rotation help isn't a luxury item anymore, it's the obvious need.
None of this kills the Twins' season on its own, but it strips away the margin for error. Losing Lopez was one thing; losing two more arms who were supposed to be the next wave makes the gap between now and October a lot harder to close without outside reinforcements.