Apr 6, 2016; Atlanta, GA, USA; A baseball is shown on the Major League logo before the Atlanta Braves host the Washington Nationals at Turner Field. Mandatory Credit: Jason Getz-USA TODAY Sports
Apr 6, 2016; Atlanta, GA, USA; A baseball is shown on the Major League logo before the Atlanta Braves host the Washington Nationals at Turner Field. Mandatory Credit: Jason Getz-USA TODAY Sports /
Lefty reliever A.J. Minter dominated multiple levels in the minor leagues for the Atlanta Braves in 2016. What does 2017 hold?
Player Profile
The Atlanta Braves drafted A.J. Minter in 2015 in spite of his Tommy John surgery, knowing he wouldn’t throw until 2016.
Alex Jordan Minter was originally drafted by the Detroit Tigers out of high school in Texas in 2012 in the 38th round, but he already had a strong commitment to attend Texas A&M.
After 2 excellent seasons in the bullpen for the Aggies, Minter moved into the rotation in 2015, but after just four, albeit dominating, starts, Minter had to have surgery on his elbow.
In spite of this, the Braves were willing to select Minter in the second round of the 2015 draft, knowing he wouldn’t throw a pitch in the organization that season.
He spent an extra month in extended spring training as part of his recovery, but then he opened with low-A Rome in the South Atlantic League. After not allowing a single run, he was promoted to high-A Carolina in the Carolina League. He still did not allow a run before being promoted to AA Mississippi.
In his second appearance with Mississippi, he finally gave up his first run of the season. The Braves did not allow him to pitch on consecutive days in 2016 as he recovered.
Overall on the season, he made 31 appearances, throwing 34 2/3 innings with a 1.30 ERA, 0.84 WHIP, 8.21% walk rate, and 35.07% strikeout rate.
Minter then made 3 appearances in the playoffs for Mississippi, throwing 3 1/3 innings without allowing a run, hit, or walk, and striking out 4 batters.
Size – Minter is listed at 6′ and 205 pounds, which appears right, and for a guy in his first professional season, he’s definitely at physical maturity.
Delivery – Minter throws from the stretch exclusively in relief. His delivery as a starter with his wind had some rough patches that have been eliminated by going to a pure stretch delivery.
Minter has a very controlled delivery to the moment he releases the ball, bringing his knee just under waist level before exploding toward the plate in one fluid motion.
He releases the ball from a high 3/4 slot, which I did not was the one thing that tends to waver if he does get off, as he’ll often touch down with his lead leg in his delivery earlier, and his arm slot would lower due to this, leading to sometimes where he would seem to be “slinging” the ball.
Control (55) – When you’re only coming in for one-inning stretches, it’s hard to really exhibit poor control unless it’s really, really bad. Likewise, it’s hard to exhibit excellent control unless it’s truly pinpoint stuff.
Minter showed solid ability to control pitches within the zone if still some work needed to command his pitches, especially with what seems to be added movement due to his added velocity out of the bullpen.
Most pitchers coming back from TJS tend to find their second full season back is when they truly find their command of their pitches again, and it’s crazy to think that Minter could even be BETTER in 2017 with increased command of his repertoire!
Pitches
Fastball (65) – Minter has worked with his fastball in the 94-96 range as a reliever primarily, touching 98-99 at peak velocity.
His fastball gets an incredible amount of arm side run and sink that allows him to really attack hitters low in the zone.
He does an excellent job up in the zone attacking with the fastball, getting the same arm side run, and that got a ton of swing and miss on hitters, especially right-handed hitters, when he climbed the ladder.
Change Up (50) – While he rarely uses the change, he certainly could use the pitch as it does offer a solid look for hitters, but he doesn’t get near the movement that he does with his fastball on the change, so it’s more of an arm deception pitch for infrequent looks to keep hitters honest.
Slider (65) – As much as Touki Toussaint‘s curve gets GIF’d by people, Minter’s slider is worthy of working into that same class. He really has two different movements on the pitch.
The slider typically sits in the mid-80s, touching upper 80s. The typical pitch has incredibly unique break that works more horizontal than vertical in it’s movement, and it leaves hitters simply dumbfounded at the plate.
A typical slider will break down and away from a pitcher’s arm side, but Minter gets movement that often will break in a cut movement rather than with downward trajectory, cutting across the zone.
Minter throws a more traditional breaking slider, but it also goes beyond, breaking so hard that he can bury the pitch at the right-hander’s toes.
The only issue with the slider that I see is commanding the pitch, especially the traditional-breaking pitch that he can bury in the dirt if he misses.
MLB Player Comp
I mentioned him in my fall report, and the comparison still sticks strong with Zach Britton to Minter.
Both work best when they’re working low in the zone with their fastball, with Minter working his ball low and Britton’s more of a true sinker.
Both work their sliders with more horizontal movement than vertical movement, with some even calling Minter’s a combo slider/cutter due to the velocity he can get on the pitch.
Obviously, Britton’s coming off a near-historic season as a reliever, but looking at his career, it did take some time for him to establish himself in that role, converting to relief in 2014 after spending his entire minor league career as a starter.
Having dealt with Thoracic Outlet Syndrome as a freshman in college and Tommy John surgery, Minter has really experienced two of the more major issues facing pitcher health in the current game.
Due to that, it’s unlikely that the Braves move Minter back to the rotation, especially when he could legitimately make an impact on the 2017 Atlanta Braves bullpen, whereas his impact as a starter likely would not be for multiple seasons most likely.
He’ll likely open with AA or AAA, but there’s every possibility that Minter is dominating in spring and ends up earning a major league job this spring.
