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At age 31, Byron Buxton’s sprint speed is still in the 97th percentile among all big-leaguers. Buxton holds the career all-time stolen base percentage, at 88.57%. To paraphrase ZZ Top, he’s got wheels, and he knows how to use them.
Here’s the thing, though: Dating back to 2019, Byron Buxton has stolen nine or fewer bases per season. Looking at his stolen base per 100 plate appearance rate, he has ranged from as high as one stolen bag per roughly 30 plate appearances, to as low as one swipe per 62 plate appearances. This isn’t a bad rate, but it is certainly low for someone with his speed.
There are some clear reasons for this. Buxton has often been injured and the hard start and stop (or slide) can exacerbate lingering injuries; he has likely wanted to avoid getting a new injury when he’s been healthy; he does an incredible job going first-to-third or second-to-home on a single, anyway; and as often as not, he’s been hitting bombs. That just doesn’t create the opportunity to steal. Some good reasons, to be sure. And yet…
A curious thing has happened this spring. In just 10 spring at-bats, Buxton has stolen two bags—and one of those was third base. Buxton has never stolen third in his big-league career, when the games count. When Twins manager Rocco Baldelli was asked about it postgame, he sounded pleased to see his cornerstone getting more active.
“I think that him going makes a lot of sense. It’s something that he hasn’t done a lot of," Baldelli told reporters. "If you’re going to implement it during the season, you might as well break it out. You might bust it out in spring training once or twice, try to get a jump. There’s probably reasons why he hasn’t [stolen third] until now. He’s been excellent at taking second base, one of the best in the game … so adding that into his game is nice. I like that he went.”
Baldelli specifically praised Buxton's acceleration, which is the key to stealing effectively—especially stealing third, since one's lead from second is larger but the catcher's throw to the base is also shorter. So what should fans make of this small-sample focus on running? Is Buxton planning on stealing aggressively this season? Twins legend Rod Carew advises it, as Buxton told the Star-Tribune’s Phil Miller.
“[Carew] told me, ‘If you don’t steal 60 [bases], I might not speak to you next spring!’,” Buxton said.
Of course, the younger man knows the game has changed since Carew was taking the world by storm. He also is aware of—and has been vocally frustrated with—his lengthy injury history. He is cognizant that this is the first spring in a while where he’s fully healthy in camp. In an interview this spring, he expressed the relief and the excitement that brings him.
“I didn’t have to go to rehab. As a mental aspect of that, you can go and have a normal offseason. That’s what you expect," he said. "I’m predicting myself to stay healthy. I don’t have too many predictions.”
Good health is both a prerequisite for running at all—Buxton didn't attempt a steal in Grapefruit League play in either 2023 or 2024—and a cause for caution. Why risk ruining a good thing, any more often than is necessary? There's one other thing to consider, however. In 2024, the Minnesota Twins had the second-worst collective sprint speed and the fourth-worst home plate-to-first time. They stole fewer bases than any team in baseball, in the easiest environment in which to steal that the game has ever seen. Given the relatively plodding, station-to-station nature of this Twins team, it’s at least worth asking these questions.
- Should fans expect this stolen base trend to continue into the regular season?
- Will Buxton have a real shot at swiping, say, 25 bags in 2025?
- And if so, is it worth the added injury risks to a player who could easily put up a 6-WAR season if he could play 150 healthy-ish games?
He's certainly fast and savvy enough to bring this team a dynamic it has long lacked. Yet, the countervailing risks are real. I don’t have the answers to these questions, so I turn the discussion over to you. What do you think? Will Buxton take advantage of his standing green light to run? And more importantly, should he? Share your thoughts below.
Twins Daily’s John Bonnes contributed to reporting live from spring training.
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