'He's a beast': You name it, Castro's doing it for Twins

MINNEAPOLIS -- It was just over three years ago now that Willi Castro's very brief tenure as the Detroit Tigers’ starting shortstop of the future came to an end. He made it two and a half weeks into the 2021 season as the guy before the Tigers swapped him over to second base -- and asked him if he could also play the outfield.

The Tigers didn’t even have a conversation with him about the move off shortstop, Castro said, but he totally understood it at the time.

“That year, it didn't work out,” Castro said. “I think that was my worst defensive and offensive year that I had. That was the worst one. Obviously, they had to make some changes to somebody that could do the work better.”

A year and a half later, the Tigers gave up on Castro altogether by non-tendering him. He signed with the Twins on a Minor League deal and fought his way onto the ‘23 roster -- and here he is, one of the Twins’ hottest-hitting and most critical players, whose homer and RBI triple off right-hander George Kirby keyed their 6-3 victory over the Mariners on Wednesday at Target Field.

That made it nine multi-hit efforts in Castro’s last 16 games, a stretch during which he has hit .375/.394/.672 for a 1.066 OPS -- and the Twins have won 14 of 16. He joined Carlos Correa and Trevor Larnach in going deep off Kirby, marking only the third time in 64 career starts for the stingy right-hander with three or more homers allowed.

The Twins later added two insurance runs off the Seattle bullpen in the eighth, with Ryan Jeffers and Max Kepler also staying red-hot with RBI doubles; Castro has been right there with them amid the surge of Minnesota’s offense in the last three weeks.

And he’s still in some disbelief that a second chance at a career has turned into all this.

“I just thought coming into last year I was fighting for a spot,” Castro said. “I had a great year last year and this year I won a spot on the roster. That’s really good for me to be a part of, for me, one of the best organizations there is. … I still can't believe it.

“Every time I go out there, it's like my first day playing in the big leagues.”

He has endeared himself to the Twins -- and to their fans -- in large part because he plays like it.

Need a squeeze bunt dropped? Castro’s your guy. Need a stolen base? Castro swiped a team-leading 33 bags last year. Need to pinch-hit for someone? Just move Castro anywhere on the field to make the move work defensively. Need a lengthy at-bat with a few good takes and a few fouls, then a homer off one of the tougher pitchers in the game? Castro did that, too, on Wednesday.

“He's a beast, man. It seems like he does everything,” Larnach said. “He's all over the field -- infield, outfield. He's bunting. He's stealing. He's hitting homers, doubles, triples. I mean, how can you not like a guy like that?”

As both a switch-hitter and someone who can play everywhere defensively but first base and catcher, Castro is the key cog that makes all of manager Rocco Baldelli’s in-game button-pressing and lever-pulling possible. That flexibility all started with that ‘21 season, when the Tigers decided Castro was no longer a shortstop and decided to start moving him around.

“It may spark a huge skill set that can help our team and help him and make it an even more interesting team,” Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said to MLB.com’s Jason Beck in ‘21.

“Interesting” vastly undersells it for these Twins -- “vital” is more like it.

The thing is, Castro might be a shortstop after all, on top of all that. When Correa went down with an intercostal strain earlier this year, Castro was the everyday guy there -- and pleasantly surprised the Twins. With Byron Buxton down now with right knee inflammation, Castro is getting the bulk of the time in center field.

Through all that, the bat and legs have been good enough to make Castro the club’s third-most valuable position player last season by both bWAR and fWAR -- and he’s building on it.

“We got some kind of fortunate going out and signing him, and I'm glad he wanted to sign here last year,” Baldelli said. “This has worked out in a huge way.”