Is there something wrong with Miguel Sano?
Not only was the Twins slugger held without a home run during the opening series in Baltimore, but he had trouble making contact at all.
Prior to his first two hits of the season in Thursday night’s series finale at Baltimore, Sano had gone hitless since leaving Florida and is striking out in nearly 50 percent of his at bats.
Sano since leaving Florida (including D.C. exhibitions):
0 for 13, 7 Ks, 2 BBs.
2 balls have left the infield: both flies to right.
— Mike BerardinoNDI (@MikeBerardino) April 7, 2016
Strikeouts are nothing new for Sano, or many other power hitters. But what might be a little troubling are indications that teams have found a weakness in the second-year slugger’s swing.
While Sano hit .269 with 18 home runs and 52 RBIs in 80 games last year, he did have one weakness.
Of Sano’s 75 hits in 2015, none of them came on a pitch in the upper-third of the strike zone. Twins blogger Rhett Bollinger notes that Sano was 0-for-25 on pitches in the upper third of the zone and was 0-for-16 on pitches above the zone.
https://twitter.com/ParkerHageman/status/717887960641703937
“I don’t like high fastballs too much,” Sano told Bollinger Thursday. “But if it’s a ball, I can let it go and get a walk. The first two games, [I’ve] been too aggressive.”
The Twins don’t seem too worried about Sano’s struggles either.
“He’s having a little trouble with the velocity pitches that are elevated,” Twins manager Paul Molitor told the Pioneer Press. “We saw a little bit of that at the end of camp. I think he’s really trying to identify pitches, and he just seems to be a tick behind some of those fastballs. We’re going to need to get him going at some point.”
After the Twins offense struggled to score runs while going 0-3 in Baltimore, there’s no time like the present.
