June 2015: The Twins chose Moran in the 7th round, out of the Carlos Beltran Baseball Academy in Florida, Puerto Rico. Jovani signed for $275,000, via scout Freddie Thon. He passed up a scholarship to the Univ. of South Florida.  

Jovani has intangibles, along with a mature approach.

In 2021, the Baseball America Prospect Handbook rated Moran as the 29th best prospect in the Twins organization. He moved up to #23 in 2022.

TRANSACTIONS

June 2015: The Twins chose Moran in the 7th round, out of the Carlos Beltran Baseball Academy in Florida, Puerto Rico. Jovani signed for $275,000, via scout Freddie Thon.   

Nov 17, 2023: Moran chose free agency.

Moran is a lefthander with a moving 92-98 mph FASTBALL he locates well. He has a slurvy-CURVEBALL that is becoming mostly a SLIDER that he keeps low in the zone effectively. He also has a CHANGEUP that has become more effective than the slider.

Moran relies mostly on a two-pitch mix led by a low 90s fastball that gets to the upper 90s at peak and an out-pitch changeup in the low 80s. His fastball is ordinary—especially by reliever standards—and got hit hard in his brief big league sample. The pitch was also his least effective offering in the minors. His changeup is a real weapon. It has received double-plus grades and generated a 51% whiff rate in the majors. He also throws a low-80s, high-spin slider but largely scrapped the pitch in his major league stint. Control has always been a question mark and weak link for Moran, and that was still the case in 2021, with a walk rate of 4.3 per nine innings in the minors. (C Collazo - BA Prospect Handbook - Spring 2022)

Moran is largely a two-pitch pitcher, with a fastball and changeup that at least flash plus. That changeup is his best pitch, an off-speed offering that falls off the table and misses a ton of bats, and some see it as a double-plus pitch. His fastball is in the low-to-mid 90's range with good life. He still does have a slider, but it’s clearly his third pitch and the changeup has been so effective, he doesn’t need it as much.

Command has been one thing that has kept Moran from progressing in the past. He walked 5.4 per nine in 2019. But he was doing a better finding the strike zone more consistently in 2021. He doesn’t need pinpoint command as a reliever, and it looks like he might be back on track towards reaching his ceiling as lefty middle or setup man. (Spring 2022) 

2022 Season Pitch Usage/Avg. Velo: Fastball 50% - 93.3 mph; Change 46% - 83 mph' Slider 3.5% - 81 mph.

Moran racks up strikeouts with his two-pitch combination. He pairs his heater with a diving changeup to miss bats. His 18.4 percent swinging strike out rate ranked fourth in the Southern League. And that's primarily because of his devastating changeup which some scouts rank as double plus. The heater is more of a solid average pitch. Moran also needs to improve on his below average control. (Spring 2021)

"His swing-and-miss rates really get your attention when he’s going good,” Twins CEO Derek Falvey said after the 2019 season. "He’s got a slider that can be absolutely devastating.”

Jovani comes at hitters from a high three-quarters arm slot. It is a smooth, clean and fluid delivery that Moran easily repeats.

He has a slight build, but if he can continue to fill out and develop his changeup, he has the stuff that could develop into an effective lefty starter.

2021 Season: Stats (MiLB):  67.1 IP, 2.41 ERA, 0.89 WHIP, 42 K%, 12 BB%

Stats (MLB):  8 IP, 7.88 ERA, 2.00 WHIP, 26 K%, 18 BB%

This is not a name that you’ll see on many lists yet, but Moran had potentially the nastiest changeup in all of minor league baseball last year. While the performance didn’t immediately translate to MLB success in his short stint at the end of the year, there are at least a couple of nuggets that he can hopefully build on. First, his swinging strike rate in his eight short innings was 16.7%, on par with the best relievers in the league. Given a longer stay in the majors, I think we would have seen that K-rate climb over 30%.

Second, his changeup was just as good as advertised. He threw it a total of 76 times and generated 19 swinging strikes (25%) and allowed just five balls in play.

Only one of those batted balls went for a hit – a bunt single by Cam Gallagher. It’s a puny sample size, yes, but when you have one pitch that is that dominant, I tend to think it’s a good bet that they can find a way to leverage it. There are still lots of questions about Moran. Can he get righties out consistently enough? Can his fastball develop to an average pitch?  (Eric Dadmun - Jan. 25, 2022)

2022 Season: Entering Spring Training, there were jobs to be won in the Twins’ bullpen, but Moran was not able to stake claim to one after he allowed five runs with four walks and two home runs in four Grapefruit League appearances. He started the year with AAA-St. Paul before he was recalled to the Twins for the first of what would eventually become five times in early May. Throughout the rest of the season, Morán would shuttle back and forth between St. Paul and the Twins every few weeks, and he worked effectively at almost every opportunity.

In total, he made 31 appearances out of the Twins bullpen and 24 of them were scoreless, mostly in low-leverage situations. Moran worked 40.1 innings with a fantastic 2.21 ERA, 1.79 FIP, 32.9% strikeout rate, 11.0% walk rate, 48.9% ground ball rate, and no home runs allowed. Moran’s top-line AAA numbers were less inspired – 6.00 ERA in 24 innings – but he struck out 38.4% of the minor league batters he faced and had a very solid 3.01 FIP because he suffered from terrible batted ball luck and sequencing fortune (.451 BABIP, 65% left on base).

Even more encouraging than the great results is that Morán demonstrated some needed improvements. There is some risk inherent in drawing insights by comparing to Moran’s 2021 since it was such a limited sample. But the data clearly suggests that he did some things differently.  (JohnFoley@JohnFoley_21 - Oct 18, 2022)

2023 Season: Battling inconsistencies stemming from his below-average command. He picked up nine holds for the Twins this past season but struggled to a 5.31 ERA with a diminished 26.1% strikeout rate and an alarming 14.7% walk rate.

2024 Season: Morán, will not go on Boston’s 40-man roster but does have a fair amount of big league time with the Twins.

He emerged as an important member of Minnesota’s bullpen in 2022 (posting a 2.21 ERA and striking out 54 batters) and in total, has a 4.15 ERA in 91 innings over the last three years. The Puerto Rico native struggled to a 5.31 ERA in 43 games, then missed the end of the season due to a forearm strain before undergoing Tommy John surgery after the year.

The Twins non-tendered him, then re-signed him to a minor league contract before he missed all of 2024.

2025 Season: After missing the entire 2024 season due to Tommy John surgery, former Twins lefty Jovani Moran returned to the mound with the Red Sox. Boston acquired him on Christmas Eve for Mickey Gasper, but he didn’t return to the mound until mid-June.

Moran pitched in 26 games in the minors and just two in the majors with Boston. He pitched decently in the minors, posting a 3.82 ERA, 1.36 WHIP, 57 strikeouts, and just 10 walks in 35 ⅓ innings. In the small sample size in the majors, Moran allowed three runs and three walks with five strikeouts in four innings of work.  (Theo Tollefson - Dec 6, 2025 - Zone Coverage)

June 24-Oct. 4, 2016: Moran was on the DL the entire season following surgery to have bone chips removed from this throwing elbow. 

May 4-22, 2019: Jovani was on the IL with an elbow flareup.

May 27, 2019: Moran was on the IL with a bout of shoulder soreness.

2024: Moran missed the entire season after undergoing Tommy John surgery following the ’23 campaign.