The remarkable offensive resurgence of Twins catcher Christian Vazquez

Vazquez has gone from being one of the worst hitters in baseball to one of the hottest.

Jul 7, 2024; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; Minnesota Twins catcher Christian Vazquez (8) runs the bases on his game-winning home run against the Houston Astros in the ninth inning at Target Field. / Bruce Kluckhohn-USA TODAY Sports

Christian Vazquez was one of the worst regular offensive players in baseball for the first three months of the 2024 season.

From the start of the year through the end of June, the Twins' veteran catcher had a wRC+ of 26, which was fifth-worst out of the 365 players with at least 100 plate appearances in that span (a 100 wRC+ is the league average). Across 48 games and 167 PAs, Vazquez was hitting .181 with a .459 OPS and 2 home runs.

After a dreadful 2023 season in which he posted a .598 OPS in 102 games to kick off a three-year, $30 million contract, things had somehow gotten even bleaker for Vazquez in his second season with the Twins. He was still splitting playing time with Ryan Jeffers because he's the far better defensive catcher of the two, but his bat was a black hole in Minnesota's lineup whenever he played.

Then the calendar turned to July and something flipped for Vazquez in a remarkable way. He homered in his first game of the month and again in his third, and he's continued to produce since then. After notching a hit on Thursday night — on the day he celebrated reaching ten years of MLB service time — Vazquez has at least one knock in 11 of his last 12 outings.

Ready for the numbers? In 21 games and 71 PAs since the start of July, Vazquez is hitting .338 with 5 homers and a 1.002 OPS. His 177 wRC+ in that span leads all MLB catchers and is a top-20 mark among all players (minimum 50 PAs). It's a small sample size and obviously unsustainable, but this has been a huge and totally unexpected stretch from a player who was struggling immensely at the plate.

8 ate 🍽️ pic.twitter.com/CsQZstvQ45

— Minnesota Twins (@Twins) August 14, 2024

Vazquez has made some adjustments to his stride that have helped him turn his season around, as shown by Parker Hageman here.

christian vazquez 📈

+ added a toe tap in load
+ keeps him back, not out front chasing cb/sl

start of 2024-may ⬅️
.162/.182/.200
39% chase%
14% swinging strike
33% pull%

jun-present ➡️
.286/.327/.505
27% chase%
8% swinging strike
48% pull% pic.twitter.com/ji2d31yGds

— parker hageman (@HagemanParker) August 14, 2024

This hot stretch from Vazquez has come at a big time for the Twins, who are 4 games back of Cleveland in the AL Central and safe by 4.5 games in a wild card spot. It has also coincided with a lengthy cold spell from Jeffers, who has a 62 wRC+ since June 1 after a scorching 148 mark in the season's first two months.

Jeffers has played more than Vazquez this season and still has much better season-long numbers at the plate, but the playing time has been split evenly in August as the 33-year-old Puerto Rican has been on fire. If Vazquez can continue to hit at a decent clip moving forward, he'll be valuable for the Twins because he plays the catcher position at a very high level.

There are still more than six weeks until the postseason begins, but Vazquez is currently making his case to be in the lineup when that time comes. Last year, Jeffers started all six of the Twins' playoff games. Vazquez, a two-time World Series champion with the Red Sox and Astros who has played in 31 career postseason contests, didn't see the field once last October. That'll change this year if he keeps swinging a hot bat.