This is the Worst Version of José Miranda

[Cody Pirkl]

His career has had many ups and downs—some due to injury, and some due to the nature of his plate approach. He can run white-hot for long periods, and then turn ice-cold without warning. To begin 2025, we’ve seen the latter.

Image courtesy of Peter Aiken-Imagn Images

At the midway point of last season, José Miranda looked like he had hit his way back into the Twins' plans. He slashed .325/.366/.522 in the first half, but suffered a back injury and posted a .543 OPS to finish the season. As a result, the Twins didn’t trust him to become the full-time first baseman headed into 2025. In a small sample this season, he’s proven their decision correct.

Miranda was a late-blooming prospect. It took him a few years to turn his ability to make frequent contact into an ability to do damage. Even as he ascended through the minor leagues, his consistency was always the question, as his lack of patience canceled out his lack of swing-and-miss. That's precisely what we’ve seen from him (at his worst) at the MLB level.

So far this season, Miranda’s plate approach has continued to hold him back. The Royce Lewis and Brooks Lee injuries have allowed him to play in every game thus far, but he has done little to seize the opportunity.

Miranda whiffing at nearly 33% of pitches is likely the result of the small sample, but the rest of his profile affirms the concerns many have long harbored about him. He’s chased over 40% of pitches outside the zone, which has always been his chief flaw. It’s resulted in minimal hard contact, which will continue even as the whiff rate stabilizes.

We’re watching the worst version of Miranda right now. We’ve seen it before, and so far in 2025, it appears he hasn’t ironed out these tendencies. We know he can be a force at the plate when locked in and 100% healthy, but he’s continually bounced between extreme highs and extreme lows in his career, with little in between.

When he’s seeing pitches in the zone, his ability to make contact has resulted in some memorable performances. When pitchers decide not to throw him anything to hit, he’s taking the same swings and badly slumping. It also results in very low walk rates, and Miranda has yet to earn a free pass this season.

We still aren’t sure of the timelines for Brooks Lee and Royce Lewis, but Miranda will have to go on a run offensively before either of them returns. The Twins have no shortage of options in the DH spot, where Miranda will likely need most of his playing time to come from when another third baseman is ready to take over in the field. The Twins are doubtful of him, considering he’s been hitting in the 8th spot against right-handed pitching. It’s up to Miranda to prove them wrong.

A major-league hitter can make a living chasing pitches and making frequent contact. Twins fans got to experience the highs and lows of this strategy for years when Eddie Rosario was roaming the outfield. It’s a difficult needle to thread regarding sustained performance, though, and it typically doesn’t age well. The Twins, notably, cut bait with Rosario in his last year of arbitration at age 29 and were proven correct. 

The hope was that Miranda could evolve at the plate to become more well-rounded and consistent. The early returns in 2025 show the same problematic plate approach, and as he nears 27 years of age, the likelihood of adjusting has significantly declined. He may always be a feast-or-famine hitter, cut from the opposite end of the same cloth as hitters such as Joey Gallo and Miguel Sano. 

It’s an important year for Miranda, and he’s gotten off to a discouraging start. While the sample size is minuscule, many of his past deficiencies at the plate have been alive and well so far. Can he turn it around before another third baseman is ready to return?

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[Doctor Gast]

Like Correa, Miranda starts cold in the cold weather, cut them both some slack. Once he warms up, Miranda is a very good hitter; the main focus for the Twins is to keep him healthy. A job they haven't been doing so good at.

[jmlease1]

It's not a great start for Miranda at the plate, but it's also not been a good start at the pate for everyone not named Bader or Castro, so I'm not going to single Miranda out too much. But he does need to get going; he's got too much talent to struggle for a month or longer and the Twins need him to hit. We'll see if he can stop expanding the strike zone?

I will say, he's been doing fine defensively, so it's good to see he's not tracking his woes at the plate into the field, and he's made at least one play already that I would not have expected from him this season (charging in on a slow bouncer with a runner crossing in front of him, he made a clean play and good throw to get the runner against StL. Feel like he would have rushed the throw last season assuming he got to it cleanly in the first place). Hope that continues, it would be nice to feel confident in him at 3B.

[stringer bell]

Two views above. Put me more with the OP. Miranda has moments, but there's a lot of inconsistency. Add in that he is a slow runner with limited power and not a gifted defender and you have a guy that has to really hit well and we haven't seen enough of that. His career hasn't justified middle-of-the-order placement and he needs to be a middle-of-the-order hitter to overcome his deficiencies. 

[tony&rodney]

Sad to say, but Miranda has looked bad thus far. Hopefully he hits starting today. 

[Road trip]

18 PA's is just statistical noise.

He's had a poor start, but so has most of the Twins lineup.  Check back on May 10.

[stringer bell]

The first twelve games last year the Twins were 4-8 and nobody was hitting. So far, pretty much the same thing. I'm sure they'll regress to the mean, but Miranda has clearly reinforced where his deficiencies lie. I'd like to see a more athletic and powerful team and Miranda really isn't either of those things. 

[Linus]

This year is big for a bunch of guys including Miranda. All of Miranda Larnach Julien  Martin Jeffers even Wallner and Lewis need to play well this year. Like Miranda they all have to hit because they are sub par fielders and slow runners (except Martin). It should be expected that several will take the next step and cement themselves as big leaguers and several will fall back and likely move on. Time will tell but we don’t know at this point. What is obvious is that Miranda better learn to control the strike zone in a hurry or he gone. One last thing: we can officially stop with the health excuses - the guy has been healthy for a while now. 

[CRF]

I wouldn't put a whole lot into his cold start...yet. Give it a little while. If you look around the league, there are plenty of real good hitters doing absolutely nothing at the plate. That's not unusual. Miranda is a decent enough hitter, I think he'll start to heat up. I'm more concerned with his defense, than his bat.  

[Rod Carews Birthday]

It’s been six games.  We see it because it’s the first six games.  During the season, passages like this happen to most players at some point but we don’t notice because it gets lost in the pile of at bats.   Take a breath and give the guy a break.  

[DJL44]

I think we will see Miranda and Julien in a platoon for the near future with Castro taking the other spot in the lineup and moving defensively between 2B and 3B.

[Craig Arko]

Clearly they need the sausage back. Then we will see the wurst version of Miranda.

[nicksaviking]

Swinging at and missing pitches has to be significantly harder to correct than swinging at the wrong pitches. And Miranda is far from alone in this issue. I'm really starting to believe the problem is as much systematic as it is individual.

[Twins_Fan_in_NJ]

28 minutes ago, nicksaviking said:

Swinging at and missing pitches has to be significantly harder to correct than swinging at the wrong pitches. And Miranda is far from alone in this issue. I'm really starting to believe the problem is as much systematic as it is individual.

Was hoping a new hitting coach would improve the tendency to swing at stuff outside of the zone, but so far, it's been a repeat of 2022, 2023 and 2024. 

[nicksaviking]

33 minutes ago, Twins_Fan_in_NJ said:

Was hoping a new hitting coach would improve the tendency to swing at stuff outside of the zone, but so far, it's been a repeat of 2022, 2023 and 2024. 

That's probably a tough thing to coach out of a player in only two months of spring training, so I'm not writing off the new hitting coach just yet. I'm not giving him a pass though either. 

[DJL44]

27 minutes ago, Twins_Fan_in_NJ said:

Was hoping a new hitting coach would improve the tendency to swing at stuff outside of the zone, but so far, it's been a repeat of 2022, 2023 and 2024. 

Looking over the Twins statcast page compared to MLB

Stat Twins MLB average

Zone Swing% 65.7 66.3

Zone Contact% 83.3 81.1

Chase% 29.4 29.0

Chase Contact% 47.4 55.2

They're basically league average. Barrel% and Hard Hit% are better than average. Angle is league average 13%. The one problem they're having is not enough line drives.

 

[Maybe Next Year]

How about we quit talking about the players and talk about the manager. Our manager is so smart he calls every pitch from the dugout based on his analytics. To heck with the catcher that knows what is and isn’t working for the pitcher that particular day. I pretty much know this comment won’t be allowed. Time to get a manager who has baseball sense and doesn’t rely on his computer to manage a team. 

[stringer bell]

4 minutes ago, Maybe Next Year said:

How about we quit talking about the players and talk about the manager. Our manager is so smart he calls every pitch from the dugout based on his analytics. To heck with the catcher that knows what is and isn’t working for the pitcher that particular day. I pretty much know this comment won’t be allowed. Time to get a manager who has baseball sense and doesn’t rely on his computer to manage a team. 

Do you really believe that Rocco consults his laptop and signals in every pitch? I really don't. Pete and the pitcher might consult on what to throw, but the pitcher and catcher don't have time to look to the dugout for every pitch. There's plenty to debate about any big league manager and Baldelli isn't without flaws, but this managing from a laptop stuff is overblown.

[Doc Lenz]

Takes a quick glance to get a signal from the dugout.

[h2oface]

Maybe he needs to train with Correa again, eh? Beause Carlos really knows how to prepare for a season.

[LambchoP]

To me it looks like Miranda is maybe pressing, trying to hard to earn a lineup spot. He needs to be much more selective at the plate. Unless he absolutely breaks out this year, I don't see him being a part of our long term plans. Not with Lewis and Lee returning from injury. I was thinking if Miranda can up his value a bit by the trade deadline we package him and a young starter, maybe Raya for some offensive help. First baseman maybe, if France doesn't come around. Sounds like MountCastle is available. Not sure if he's a straight rental or has control remaining?

[stringer bell]

45 minutes ago, LambchoP said:

To me it looks like Miranda is maybe pressing, trying to hard to earn a lineup spot. He needs to be much more selective at the plate. Unless he absolutely breaks out this year, I don't see him being a part of our long term plans. Not with Lewis and Lee returning from injury. I was thinking if Miranda can up his value a bit by the trade deadline we package him and a young starter, maybe Raya for some offensive help. First baseman maybe, if France doesn't come around. Sounds like MountCastle is available. Not sure if he's a straight rental or has control remaining?

I've been pretty downbeat on Miranda in this thread. I'll say this now if he's in the right situation, he could thrive. Put him on an athletic team where all he has to do it hit and he might fit right in. I'm thinking Cardinals or Orioles. As far as a package goes, I think the Twins could possibly deal someone currently in the rotation with team control because the options at Triple A are pretty good. 

[RpR]

Not a fan of Miranda, but right now his bat is very similar to Wallner; give it time.

[USAFChief]

2 hours ago, RpR said:

Not a fan of Miranda, but right now his bat is very similar to Wallner; give it time.

Say what??

[joefish]

On 4/3/2025 at 2:58 PM, h2oface said:

Maybe he needs to train with Correa again, eh? Beause Carlos really knows how to prepare for a season.

Just wait until June when it warms up. (Correa's words from last spring.)