'It felt awesome': Miranda walks off on Hader

MINNEAPOLIS -- At the beginning of this season, when Jose Miranda received his first call to the Major Leagues, he carried the weight of the expectations of a breakout 2021 season, one for which he was named the organization’s Minor League Player of the Year. He put too much pressure on himself to make a big league impact. He was trying too hard, he thinks, as he slumped hard.

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It took Carlos Correa and the other veterans in the clubhouse to remind Miranda how good of a hitter he is, how this is the same game he dominated at the Double-A and Triple-A levels last season, and how he should, above all, have fun. And look at him now.

Miranda has never had a bigger moment as a professional than when he took a mighty hack at a slider from Josh Hader in the ninth inning of Wednesday’s game, dropped his bat as the ball soared into Target Field’s upper deck for a three-run blast and strutted out of the batter’s box while staring and nodding at his teammates as they streamed out of the dugout to kick off the celebration of a 4-1 walk-off victory over the Brewers in front of the Twins’ first sellout crowd of the season.

“The moment I hit the ball, I knew it was gone,” Miranda said. “Just hitting off a guy like that, it felt awesome."

Think he’s having fun yet?

“He’s having a good time, and he should,” manager Rocco Baldelli said. “When you hit a ball like that in front of a great crowd and you do it off, probably, one of the five most dominant pitchers in baseball -- and I might be shortchanging Hader at this point -- you can have some fun. He’s earned his fun right there.”

The first walk-off homer of Miranda’s career traveled a Statcast-projected 396 feet to the second deck in left field and marked only the fourth homer allowed by Hader this season -- all coming since June 5. It followed a leadoff walk by Jorge Polanco and a single by Max Kepler and finally cashed in one of the Twins’ seemingly endless scoring opportunities that ended without payoff, which had resulted in Minnesota matching its season high with 13 runners left on base.

The Twins had also put multiple runners on base in the second, third, fourth, fifth and seventh innings, but they had plated their lone run in the second, when Gilberto Celestino blooped a two-out knock to give his team a short-lived 1-0 lead. Miranda himself had the opportunity to put Minnesota ahead with less drama in the seventh, when he came to the plate with men on second and third and one out, but he popped up to shortstop before Ryan Jeffers grounded out to end the threat.

That was on Miranda’s mind when he stepped to the plate in the ninth with a chance for redemption. He was looking for Hader’s slider. He got Hader’s slider. He didn’t miss it.

"The slider wasn’t working the way it was [Tuesday],” Hader said. “Maybe I trusted it a little bit too much.”

The 24-year-old Miranda joined Byron Buxton (twice) as the only Twins to hit walk-off homers this season. Miranda also owned Minnesota’s last walk-off hit of any kind, a single off Orioles closer Jorge López on July 2.

When Miranda woke up on May 20, he was hitting .094/.143/.189 through his first 14 games as a big leaguer, with three extra-base hits in 56 plate appearances. In the 40 games since then, he has been one of the best hitters in the American League.

Miranda’s 3-for-5 performance on Wednesday gave him a .331/.366/.576 slash line with seven homers and 10 doubles in that stretch, with his .942 OPS ranking seventh among AL hitters with at least 100 plate appearances in that span, ahead of the likes of Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani and Julio Rodríguez.

This is who Miranda is, the hitter whose improved selectivity at the plate helped his power explode last season. Even with Miguel Sanó a step away from the big leagues on a rehab assignment in Triple-A St. Paul, Miranda’s continued production could give the Twins a tough roster crunch in the coming weeks.

The Twins are already reaping the benefits.

“I see a lot of talent, a lot of potential,” Correa said. “I see a great hitter in him. I see a guy that's going to hit for a long time in this league. … Sometimes, as baseball players, when we're young, we self-doubt ourselves because of how tough the game is.

“I know how good he was last year, and I know by just watching his swing how good he's going to be.”