Bobby Cuellar Should Replace Rick Anderson as Minnesota Twins Pitching Coach

It only took a little over seven weeks and 43 games for the Twins starting rotation to almost completely turnover. As the season moves into the Memorial Day weekend for the official start of summer, the rotation looks more like that of the Rochester Red Wings than the Minnesota Twins. 

Something had to give. The Twins' starters have the highest ERA in baseball at 6.39 and the most  losses with 23.

Three pitchers have been removed from the rotation. Francisco Liriano is now pitching out of the bullpen, Jason Marquis has been designated for assignment, and Nick Blackburn is on the disabled list. Combined, they were 3-13 with an 8.71 ERA in 20 starts.

Taking their place have been three pitchers who started the season with the Twins Triple-A affiliate, the Rochester Red Wings: Scott Diamond, who leads the team with a 3-1 record with a 1.78 ERA; P.J. Walters, who is 2-1 with a 2.95 ERA; and Cole DeVries, who made his major league debut on Thursday against the White Sox. 

Anthony Swarzak, who started the year in the bullpen, joins these three along with Carl Pavano to complete the rotation.

If the Twins are going to have any chance of salvaging the 2012 season, it will depend heavily on the success of their starters. To aid in that success, Minnesota might want to consider promoting the man that may have the most knowledge of these pitchers.

That man would be Rochester pitching coach Bobby Cuellar.

Cuellar has been the Red Wings pitching coach since 2009. It is his second stint with Rochester, having also served there from 2002 to 2005. He spent time as a coach with major league teams Seattle, Montreal, Texas and Pittsburgh.

He was the pitching coach in Seattle when Randy Johnson won the American League Cy Young in 1995, and in Montreal when Pedro Martinez won the National League Cy Young in 1997.

Cuellar was drafted by the Texas Rangers out of the University of Texas-Austin in the 29th round in 1974. He spent 11 seasons in the minor leagues, seven of them at the Triple-A level. He had a career 53-42 record with a 3.56 ERA.

His entire major league career covered only 6.2 innings in four relief appearances in 1977.

As the old adage goes, those who can't do, teach. Perhaps Cuellar, who couldn't "do" at the major league level, is the right man to help this young starting rotation. 

Cuellar, who speaks Spanish, might also be able to help turn around Liriano, who we've heard repeatedly has the best stuff on the Twins pitching staff.

This is not meant so much as a knock against current pitching coach Rick Anderson, who has been very successful as a part of Ron Gardenhire's coaching staff since 2002, but as a statement that something has been broken over the past two seasons.

Only the Baltimore Orioles have had a higher ERA than the Twins since the beginning of the 2011 season.

With DeVries' start against the White Sox, the Twins have used nine different starters this year. That's as many they used all last season. While injuries and ineffectiveness cannot totally be blamed on Anderson, he does have to shoulder some of the failures of the Twins pitching staff.