Miguel Sano demoted to Single-A less than a year after All-Star appearance

It’s been a long way down for Miguel Sano over the last year. The Twins infielder was demoted all the way to Class A Advanced Fort Myers on Thursday, reports the Star Tribune. The move comes less than a year after he was named to the American League All-Star team.

Sano’s fall from grace this season in Minnesota has been startling. He burst onto the scene in 2015 as one of the game’s most exciting young talents and appeared to be putting it together after a 2017 where he hit 28 homers in 114 games and reached his first All-Star Game.

However, the wheels have totally come off in 2018. Sano is hitting just .203/.270/.405 with seven home runs in 148 plate appearances. In June, he’s batted 6-of-40 with zero homers and a .468 on-base plus slugging percentage.

The struggles have pushed the Twins to do something aggressive by pushing him down not just to the minors, but all the way down to the Class A level. It’ll be the first time he’s appeared at such a low level of baseball since 2013, when he was a wunderkind prospect who hit 35 homers in 125 games across three leagues.

Here’s a bit more on the decision to send him to Fort Myers instead of a Class AA or Class AAA affiliate.

Sano signed with the Twins as a free agent out of the Dominican Republic and made his MLB debut in 2015. Over three-plus MLB seasons, he’s batted .248/.339/.485 with 78 home runs and 222 RBI in 347 games.