If at the beginning of the season you had to hazard a guess as to who would be the league's most valuable pitcher more than two months into the year, chances are Mike Minor wouldn't have even crossed your mind.
Yet here we are, approaching the halfway point of the season, and the Rangers' ace is still obliterating his AL competition in pitching WAR.
2019 AL Pitching WAR Leaders
— Baseball Reference (@baseball_ref) June 11, 2019
Mike Minor (4.5)
Justin Verlander (3.5)
Matthew Boyd (3.2)
Lucas Giolito (2.9)
All Leaders: https://t.co/yqeu2YQ6Zj
It's absurd. Nobody's even remotely close to him. Second-place Justin Verlander, a sure-fire Hall of Famer, is a full win behind him.
And the craziest part is that his ridiculous run of success has practically come out of nowhere. He's already 0.8 bWAR ahead of his next best season, 2018, and he's started half as many games.