Detroit Tigers' Keston Hiura made major change with swing in hopes of returning to MLB

LAKELAND, Fla. — Keston Hiura isn't the same player he used to be.

That's a double-edged sword.

The bad: Hiura isn't an active MLB player anymore. He came up as one of the top prospects in baseball and burst onto the scene as the second baseman for the Milwaukee Brewers in 2019, hitting .303 with 19 home runs in 84 games. His performance on offense at the highest level has gone downhill since then.

The good: Hiura has changed some things about his offense since Oct. 5, 2022, his last appearance in the big leagues. He discovered the foundation of his swing mechanics and built from the ground up, and as a result of the simplified mechanics, he raked at the Triple-A level last season, but the Brewers didn't call him up.

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"This is a game of adjustments, Hiura said. "It look me a little longer to figure out what I needed to do to get back to being who I am, but that's also a good thing. Once I figured that out, I had a foundation to work off and understood myself more as a player. I felt really good last year. I want to build off that."

The Detroit Tigers signed Hiura — the No. 9 overall pick in the 2017 draft out of UC Irvine — to a minor-league contract at the beginning of spring training. The 27-year-old, nearly five years removed from his MLB debut, projects as the primary first baseman in Triple-A Toledo, but if he continues to hit for power while trimming his strikeout rate, he could factor in with the Tigers.

He knows what he needs to do.

"If I swing the bat well, there are opportunities for me," Hiura said.

The Tigers don't have upper-level depth at first base behind Spencer Torkelson, so that's where Hiura slots in with the Mud Hens, but he also plays left field.

"The power is hard to deny," manager A.J. Hinch said. "He's always hit in Triple-A, and now he's working his way back after an incredible first impression in the big leagues. He had to battle a little bit of adversity, and now he gets an opportunity to meet some new people, see a new side to his development and get back to the big leagues."

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Hiura has a track record of hitting for power. He launched 14 home runs across 80 games for the Brewers in 2022, which coincided with the year he first implemented changes to his swing.

His 2021 season was miserable.

"That was the year I really struggled," said Hiura, who hit .168 with four homers in 61 games. "Throughout my whole carer, I just went up there, swung the bat and tried to hit the ball hard. For the longest time, it worked. When things start to go bad, you start to look back at previous swings, swings that made you successful, but I didn't have a foundation of what to go back on."

Hiura, a right-handed hitter, had to learn what made his swing successful.

He rebuilt his swing by eliminating excess movement, such as a toe tap and a leg kick. He focused on getting his lead foot on the ground to generate force and keep his balance before his upper half attacked the ball. The changes resulted in 14 home runs across 80 games with the Brewers in 2022, but still, Hiura stuck out in 41.7% of his trips to the plate.

His strikeout rate got worse in each season with the Brewers, from 30.7% in 2019 to 41.7% in 2022.

"Once I learned a little bit more," Hiura said, "getting an understanding of what makes my swing successful, it was easier to get back into the rhythm of things and make those adjustments."

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In 2023, Hiura implemented a no-stride approach in two-strike situations in an effort to cut down on strikeouts. He committed to the no-stride approach at the end of last year's spring training when he was removed from the 40-man roster, cleared waivers and outrighted to the minor leagues. He then implemented the no-stride approach within the first two or three weeks of the season.

This time, Hiura spent the entire season with Triple-A Nashville. He hit .308 with 23 home runs, 31 walks (8.4% walk rate) and 90 strikeouts (24.5% strikeout rate) in 85 games.

A knee injury sidelined him from May 13 through June 21. He still logged 378 plate appearances in the minor leagues, and that was more than enough to discover the no-stride approach helped mitigate his strikeout issue.

"I was scared about it at first," Hiura said. "I was scared some of the power numbers would go away. I wasn't sure if the ball would come off the bat as hard as a normal swing, but of the 23 home runs I had last year, I think maybe 14 or 15 of them were with two strikes, so it shows if I'm able to get my foot down on top and be in the right position, I can still compete with that approach."

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Hiura raked in his first 32 games before the knee injury, hitting .331 with 12 home runs. He struggled for a few games in his return from the injury, which he described as an adjustment period, but he hit .308 with 10 homers in his final 49 games.

The former big-league slugger thought he deserved a promotion to the highest level again. After all, the Brewers' first basemen ranked 28th with a .681 OPS, while the Brewers' designated hitters ranked 30th with a .658 OPS.

A promotion never occurred.

"The goal is always to be in the big leagues," Hiura said. "Sometimes, the ball doesn't roll that way. I felt like I did everything in my control to put myself in that position, and it just didn't work out. I think some of the injuries last year played a little bit of a factor into that, as well, but at the end of the day, I was happy with my performance. I could sleep at night knowing I did everything I could to get myself to that position."

In November 2023, Hiura became a minor-league free agent and pursued a new opportunity.

The new opportunity — a minor-league contract with a $2 million salary if he makes the major leagues — led him to Lakeland, Florida, for spring training in TigerTown.

Hiura, who has four seasons of MLB experience, is expected to wind up in Triple-A Toledo coming out of spring training, but at some point this season, he hopes to join the Tigers, thus finding his way back to the big leagues.

"I'm extremely thankful for this opportunity," Hiura said. "I spent my past six, seven years with the Brewers. That journey was everything I could have asked for, but I'm really excited about being here in Lakeland, meeting the guys here, being a part of Detroit and learning more about the organization."

Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him @EvanPetzold.

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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: What Detroit Tigers' Keston Hiura is doing to return to majors