In the ninth inning of the Minnesota Twins’ game against the Milwaukee Brewers on Tuesday night, Carlos Correa stepped up to the plate with the score tied 5-5. Target Field was nearly sold out, and it felt like the crowd was half Twins fans and half Brewers fans. It had been loud all night in the stadium, regardless of which team had done something well. So when Correa made contact on a 1-1 pitch and I heard a huge roar, I wasn’t entirely sure which team’s fans were cheering. It quickly became apparent that Correa had just ended the game. I had just witnessed what Twins play-by-play announcer Dick Bremer described as his “signature moment in his year and a half with the Twins.” It truly felt like something had just happened that could jumpstart Correa’s (and Minnesota’s) season.
Correa hasn’t played to his standards at the plate for much of the season. Correa has been hovering around .200 all year, and many fans believe that he has not produced enough to be worthy of the $200 million contract Minnesota signed him to this offseason. Recently, Correa has begun to turn things around, though. He hit two massive home runs in the past week. First, a go-ahead grand slam in Toronto last Saturday afternoon in a Twins win over the Blue Jays. Then the aforementioned walk-off home run to cap off a 7-5 win over the Brewers on Tuesday.
Correa finally appears to be coming through in the clutch the way fans expected him to all year. But it’s possible that this is just a brief hot streak before he regresses. Still, it could be a sign of things to come in the future. Let’s take a closer look and see if we can find some clues as to what this recent stretch of games means for the Twins shortstop.
One way that we can determine whether or not Correa is turning the corner is by looking at his stats over the past week since his hot streak started. Between last Saturday’s game in Toronto and this Saturday’s game against the Detroit Tigers, Correa went 6 for 25 (.240). It is also worth noting that all six of Correa’s hits over the past week have gone for extra bases. Three were doubles, two were home runs (and massive ones at that), and the other was a triple.
In addition to the six extra-base hits, Correa also has nine runs batted in. Six hits in six games played is hardly lighting the league on fire, but those hits have made a big impact. A player of Correa’s caliber should be able to come through in big moments, and he has finally been starting to do that recently.
Expected Batting Average will also give us a better picture of Correa’s season. His xBA on the season is .237, 22 points higher than his actual batting average of .215. This suggests that his quality of contact and at-bats so far this year have been much better than the actual results he has been seeing at the plate. The positive results over the past week may indicate that he is finally getting rewarded for the contact and plate appearances that he has had. Maybe it was only a matter of time until things started going his way more often.
After he hit his walk-off home run against the Brewers on Tuesday night, Correa broke out his signature celebration. He tapped his wrist to mimic pointing at a watch. After he did it the first time in 2021, he said it meant “it’s my time.” Now that he is starting to come up with big hits more frequently and produce at the level that fans know he is capable of, perhaps we’re all on his time. The Twins front office signed Correa to a six-year deal because they knew how important he could be to the team. After a slow start to the first year of the contract, he is beginning to show why the front office had so much faith in him.
