Lewis turns to outside hitting coach recommended by Bobby Witt Jr. 

FORT MYERS, Fla. – After an inconsistent and often frustrating past two seasons, there’s no one in Twins camp who could use a fresh start more than Royce Lewis. The best news for the Twins? Lewis isn’t just sitting back and waiting for good things to happen. He’s taking the initiative, making changes to get better.

Over the past winter, Lewis sought guidance from an outside hitting coach other than his father for the first time in his career. He found Jeremy Isenhower, a coach recommended by Bobby Witt Jr. and Lewis’ former teammate Jorge Polanco, in search of a solid base and consistent performance.

“I always love listening to my dad,” Lewis said, “but I think I needed just a different voice just because he’s busy working. That’s a full-time job for my dad to call me every night and see what I’m doing. I’m two hours ahead of him, so he’ll probably be asleep when I’m finishing up a game in Boston or whatever, right? It just got to be a lot. And so this year, that’s something new, too. I just added a new hitting coach privately so that we can work in conjunction with [Twins hitting coach Keith Beauregard] and the new guys that we hired. And so just excited about that, too.”

Isenhower has worked with Lewis on a variety of aspects of his game since their first conversations last September. The pairing has been so impactful on Lewis that he made repeated trips from his North Texas home to the Houston area to work with Isenhower – six times in total.

On those trips, he stayed with former teammate Carlos Correa, raving about Correa’s hospitality. But while he enjoyed the visits, he was mostly in Houston to work. There may be no more pivotal player on the 2026 Twins than Lewis, who has played at a superstar level at times but slashed .237/.283/.388 in 2025.

Isenhower believes Lewis can get back to the heights of 2023 and early 2024. He raves about Lewis’ bat speed and feels that by simplifying things, Lewis can find his old form. The primary focus of their mechanical work has been pre-swing: getting Lewis into the best possible position, consistently, before he even begins his swing.

By doing that, Isenhower asserts, Lewis can let his natural talent and bat speed take over. Being in a better position will improve Lewis’ pitch recognition, his swing decisions, and ultimately the quality of his contact.

“He's the first guy I've ever had in the cage that I heard his bat whistle when he was swinging,” Isenhower said.

“With his hand speed and his hand-eye coordination, his ability. I mean … We’ve got to get him to move less. A little bit more sturdy, I guess would be the word, not tighter. His bottom half seems to be more sturdy, like a more sturdy base.”

And in case you were wondering, the Twins are completely on board with this. It seems more teams are coming to the realization that whether they like it or not, their players are going to seek outside help. So rather than resist it, Beauregard and manager Derek Shelton are working to make sure that everyone is on the same page.

“The one thing you do ask the players for is communication,” Shelton said. “If you're going to talk to your guy, give us an idea of what is being said because everybody has the common goal in mind. … If Royce's guy tells him something and Royce goes out and hits three homers and we win a game, I don't care [who] told him. It really doesn't matter because we all have the common goal of what we're doing. But there has to be guidelines on both sides.”

So the Twins are on board. And Isenhower noted that Lewis seems fully on board as well. The coach explained that sometimes a hitter will come to him in a slump, but bail on the process at the first sign of struggles, or believe things are fixed at the first success. But in talking with Lewis, Isenhower saw someone who was committed to the longer term.

“The more I got to know him,” Isenhower said, “I was like, 'OK, he seems like a type that's like, he's driven to be the best player. Not the most comfortable all the time. He doesn't mind [being] uncomfortable.' And that's probably the biggest thing that I noticed.”

That commitment might be the most encouraging thing to the Twins and anyone who wants to see Lewis succeed. After searching for his form throughout much of 2025 and late 2024, Lewis isn’t looking for a quick fix. He’s looking to take a major step forward in his career.

“It was recognition [of needing a constant voice] and the recognition I felt like I didn't have the answer for myself,” he said. “Your athleticism and talent can only take you so far in this game. You need some of those mechanical adjustments, those coaches to lean on to help out. Honestly, when Bobby Witt [Jr.] tells you something, you might want to listen.”