Minneapolis – Christian Vázquez is not making as many starts behind the plate as he did during his first two seasons in a Minnesota Twins uniform. Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said Vázquez would make fewer starts when he was just 5-for-33 through his first 13 games this season.
Vázquez isn’t the same player he used to be when the Twins first signed him in the 2022-23 offseason. Still, he’s finding ways to be an impact player on both sides of the plate.
Take Saturday’s 2-1 victory over the San Francisco Giants. Suppose Vázquez doesn’t draw a walk in his first at-bat or make the play of the game, throwing out Heliot Ramos at third in the top of the eighth when he took a bigger lead off the bases than he should have. Then, the Twins don’t win that game.
“It’s big,” said Vázquez about his role in Saturday’s win postgame. “It’s huge. Every time you can put something on the table for the team to win, and that huge moment, a one-run game, it’s huge.”
Despite going 0-for-2 in Saturday’s game, the walk Vázquez drew was the difference between Trevor Larnach‘s home run in the bottom of the third being a solo shot and Vázquez being the leading run for the 2-run shot. It was a good at-bat by Vázquez, but the funny thing was, he was hunting for strikes.
“I was trying to swing at strikes,” Vázquez said. “He got me twice with a fastball up. It looked like a sinker, and I was trying to swing at strikes.”
But the thing that had every Twins fan talking, along with the players and coaches in the clubhouse after the game, was his pick-off throw from behind home plate to get Ramos out. He saw Ramos’s lead out of the corner of his eye, and the execution from there was perfect. His throw to Royce Lewis at third, and Lewis’s tag of Ramos as he tried to slide back into the bag, were perfect.
“He said he was trying to get my eyes,” Lewis said about his end of the play postgame. “Usually, that’s exactly why you have to get eye contact, but I think in that situation, the heat of the moment, we’ve got to make a play there, and I think he just trusted the fact that I would be there ready for him.”
“That’s what we love about him,” said Baldelli. “He is a baseball player through and through, and he makes baseball-type plays on the field. That is something that I don’t know how to assess that, but when you watch a lot of this game and then you watch him play, he does so many things right. It’s a game-winning play.”
Vázquez has played seven games since Baldelli announced his reduced role during the homestand, during which they played the Chicago White Sox and Los Angeles Angels. He’s seen an improvement with his performance at the plate, going 4-for-20 with five walks, an RBI, and three runs scored.
The uptick in walks has been most impressive for Vázquez in this span of games. He only had two in his first 13 games this season. It’s a testament to the player he’s been since breaking into the league over a decade ago and the amount of prep he continues to put into every game he starts behind the plate. Everyone in the Twins clubhouse greatly appreciates it.
“That’s what he brings every day, too, which is awesome,” said Joe Ryan, whom Vázquez caught on Saturday. “He’s got such great energy, so much experience, and experience in big situations. He knows the game better than anyone probably on the team, and I think that’s a really valuable asset to have back there, especially at that position.”
“He’s got great mental strength to handle things,” said Baldelli. “He’s handled a lot of different things in his career. You could walk through his career, and you look at it and you go, ‘Man, this guy, he’s accomplished a lot.’ It’s not by chance. He continually puts himself in position to succeed, and he does that upstairs.”
As the Twins ride their eight-game winning streak into Baltimore for a three-game series, Vázquez is in a place where he may only play once a series or come into the later innings to replace Ryan Jeffers defensively behind the plate in a blowout win.
He had his moment on Saturday to be the impact player of the game that secured the Twins the win, and he’s grateful to see he’s not the only one having their moment during this ride.
“I think we’re clicking,” said Vázquez. “Everybody. Pitching and everybody’s hitting in big moments like Larnach today, a two-run homer. Every night it’s a different guy, and I think that’s very important on a winning team.”
