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Minnesota Twins: Miguel Sano promoted to Triple-A with one big thing left to work on

By Nate Palmer

MINNEAPOLIS, MN - JUNE 08: Miguel Sano #22 of the Minnesota Twins reacts to striking out against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim during the sixth inning of the game on June 8, 2018 at Target Field in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Angels defeated the Twins 4-2. (Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images)
MINNEAPOLIS, MN - JUNE 08: Miguel Sano #22 of the Minnesota Twins reacts to striking out against the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim during the sixth inning of the game on June 8, 2018 at Target Field in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Angels defeated the Twins 4-2. (Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images) /
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The Minnesota Twins are moving Miguel Sano to Triple-A Rochester as he tries to get right at the plate, but strikeouts remain an issue for him.

The Minnesota Twins have seen enough from Miguel Sano in the program they were running him through in Fort Myers to move him to Triple-A Rochester. After a few days in the Dominican Republic to spend time with his mother to help her work through some undisclosed issue, Sano got the news he would be moving to the top ranks of Twins minor league baseball.

After an offseason spent rehabbing with a brand new shiny rod in his leg, Sano struggled mightily to get anything going at the plate once the season began. After slashing .203/.270/.405 and striking out in 40.5% of his at-bats the Twins finally sent Sano to Fort Myers to focus on getting his mind and body right again.

While in Fort Myers, the focus was not on the games. The focus was on the process to get Sano swinging a bat in a way that produced positive results. Against Single-A pitchers the results were mostly positive. Sano hit .328/.442/.453 in 77 plate appearances with the Miracle. While that is a good slash line one thing still stands out, the strikeouts.

In those 77 plate appearances, Sano struck out 21 times and walked 13 times. That is down from his strikeout rate in the majors at roughly 27.3% but still not good. As Sano moves to Triple-A the pitchers will only get better making strikeouts even easier to come by.

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The hope has to be that Sano’s strikeout rate at Single-A has something to do with a bigger pitcher concept he is working through. That is something that Twins General Manager Thad Levine hinted at during an interview with Darren Wolfson recently. As Wolfson has expanded on, it could be possible Sano is taking pitches to get used to tracking and seeing them. That would then put him in 0-1 or 0-2 counts and a definite disadvantage before he finally starts swinging.

It looks like Sano is making contact well with inferior pitching. While fully expected, it is something positive for the 2017 All-Star. Sano has already performed well at Triple-A in 5 games as he slashed .375/.474/.750 in 2018 and will look to continue that in this upcoming stint.

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It is probably fair to say that everyone will be keeping an eye on the state of Sano’s slash line and expecting it to continue in a positive direction. Everyone will also be watching how much Sano strikes out. If the Twins want to win in 2019, or have some miracle run in them for 2018, they need the All-Star calibur Sano back.

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