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ANALYSIS: Especially with his injury concerns; it always felt like the closer A.J. Puk got to the majors, the further away he actually ended up. For how raw he was coming out of Florida in 2016 as the sixth overall pick, he transitioned to pro ball pretty smoothly, advancing to Double-A by 2017 and maintaining top-50 prospect status despite his 2018 absence and limited work in 2019. At 26, the 6'7, 248-lb. southpaw is a bit of an enigma. He spent time at Triple-A Vegas to start 2021 and netted super mediocre results, but with his call back to the bigs, he has picked up right where he left off in 2019. His overall performance actually got steadily worse with each promotion through the minors, but his whole career has been uncertainty and chaos to this point, which probably makes hopping between pitching roles a bit easier. In 7.1 IP across five outings this year, Puk has a 0.00 ERA, 0.82 WHIP, and 2.63 FIP, though no results yet for 2021 (he had two wins and two holds in 11.1 IP in 2019).
At times in the minors, he would allow homers at a ridiculous rate, but he has yet to give one up in the MLB in 2021, probably made easier by Puk's allowed 12.5% flyers against a fantastic 25% hard hit rate on batted balls (same as 2019) and grounders rolling out at 56% frequency (MLB average: 42.7%). His 28.6% strikeout rate is impressive but his 14.3% walk rate has no alibi, and that's a narrow margin of error to work with when your BABIP is .125. Puk is a physically gifted, versatile arm that could see time in the pen and rotation by season's end while Oakland wages war for the postseason. As a starter, long-reliever, setup man, or high-leverage gamer, Puk has the fastball/slider one-two punch that can put anyone out cold. It'd be guesswork to say that multiple holds and/or saves are definitely in his future, but Oakland loves guys that can be plugged in anywhere and that versatility is his key to cracking the opportunity window. Even if nothing of the sort happens, A.J. Puk's long-relief ability means he can accumulate more strikeouts, bring your team ERA/WHIP down, and the chance of a win or hold is greatly increased. It might not be the blockbuster call-up of 2021 to promote a 2016 draftee to the relief core, but he realistically could be the most talented player out of all the other guys throwing their "coming out" parties down the homestretch.
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