Who is Spencer Steer and why should Twins fans care?
For starters, he’s quickly climbing the Twins’ prospect rankings, coming in at No. 9 on MLB.com and No. 14 via Baseball America. The former Oregon University shortstop can play all over the infield, and his ability to hit made him the Twins’ third-round pick in the 2019 MLB Draft.
He just had himself one heckuva a weekend, hammering four homers for the St. Paul Saints, including three on Sunday. But three-homer games wasn’t something Steer was known for in the draft. In fact, in three years at Oregon he hit a total of 12 home runs.
After hitting four homers during his debut minor league season in 2019, Steer somehow found more power in his bat after the 2020 season was wiped out by the pandemic.
Steer cranked 24 homers between High-A and Double-A ball last summer, and this year he already has 14 homers: eight in 35 games at Double-A Wichita and now six long balls in just 13 games since getting promoted to Triple-A St. Paul in mid-May.
According to a recent column from The Athletic reporter Aaron Gleeman, the Twins saw more power in Steer’s swing before they drafted him, and they worked to unlock that power in 2020.
From Baseball America, regarding Steer’s three-homer Sunday:
“Spencer Steer, 3B, Twins: Last year, multi-position infielder Jose Miranda began the season at Double-A Wichita, hit his way to Triple-A St. Paul and eventually emerged as one of the bigger breakout prospects of 2021. Miranda celebrated his promotion to St. Paul with a three-home run game. Now we have Steer, a multi-positional infielder who began his season at Wichita and was recently promoted to St. Paul. Steer celebrated his promotion on Sunday with a three-home run game.”
Steer hit .307/.385/.591 at Double-A and has so far slashed .255/.349/.636 at Triple-A, doing so despite a stretch of 17 consecutive at-bats without a hit before busting out of the slump with his four-homer weekend.
The Twins are pretty well set across the infield with Gio Urshela, Jose Miranda, Carlos Correa, Jorge Polanco, Luis Arraez, and Royce Lewis, so it’s not like Steer, who is listed a second baseman by the Saints, is on a fast track to the big leagues. But he’s a good example of how much depth Minnesota has built through good drafting in recent years.
Noteworthy: Alex Kirilloff, who started the season with the Twins before a wrist injury and struggles at the plate saw him demoted to St. Paul, is hitting .386 with six homers, three doubles and 19 RBIs in just 75 at-bats since May 15. He homered once Friday, once Saturday and twice on Sunday.
