AJ Minter is a dude. While not having his best season out of the Braves bullpen, 2023 leveled out and proved the lefty Minter is a dude.
The 30-year old, Stetson-wearing Minter experienced the tale of two seasons in 2023. He had some dreadful batted ball luck in the season’s first couple of months. Somehow, he kept battling through it and ended the year 3-6 with a 3.76 ERA. That ERA is pretty remarkable, considering he had the evil 6.66 ERA still on May 31.
Some like it hot
Once the weather began heating up in June, so did AJ. He allowed just three hits and three earned runs in 13 appearances. In July, he allowed no earned runs, and in August he was once again, allowing just three earned runs in 14 appearances.
The first two months of the season were another story. He saved four games in April while Raisel Iglesias was on the IL. However, Minter also blew two saves and was 1-3 in 13 appearances. The worst of it was blowing a 4-0 lead to the Fish, allowing five in the ninth to lose to Miami…I just happened to recap that game. While the ERA skyrocketed to 8.53 by April’s end, his 2.62 FIP told a better story and indicated good things were ahead from the long-time Brave.
Atlanta still has control over Minter, who is an ARB3 player, made $4.2875 million in 2023. He will get a good pay day one of these years, but awaits an arbitration hearing , or there’s a chance. they settle on a a number beforehand. Minter is one of the better lefty relievers in the game and a durable cog in Brian Snitker’s bullpen. I look forward to a great ’24 campaign with Minter again holding down the seventh or eighth inning for the Braves. I’d like to see one more power arm added, but Minter is a dude and has proven himself to Snit.
Warren Buffett, one of the richest people in the world, just invested $8.8MM in the Braves.
What does he know?
l’ll say it again…when Liberty Media decided to split their stock to make the Atlanta Braves a separate entity, they showed their cards to every multi-billionaire across the globe. Make no mistake, the Braves can be bought.
Saw that. He is also invested in Liberty and seems to be abig baseball guy. I bought ( obviously much much less and more an emotional than strategic purchase) BATRA shares the moment they became available. Buffett coming on board should certainly help.
How’s his fastball?
It is kinda interesting that you can invest in specifically your baseball team, not an umbrella or holding company.
Does Warren’s money open the Buffet to Shohei? Let it be so…
Watching the Wash introduction at LAA and watching him speak. Damn, I wanna play for him right now. What a guy. What a loss for the Braves but so good for him.
Right on, Timo.
Yeah, Timo…but I don’t think Wash can even make the turd that is the Angels shine!
Strider 4th in the Cy Young… and I’m fine with that 🙂
That’s appropriate. We can talk about his FIP and his xFIP and what he “should” have been, but what he was was a dominant-at-times pitcher who couldn’t put it all together all the time. The similarities between him and Nolan Ryan are incredible.