Snitkers inhabit both dugouts in Braves-astros World Series
Father Brian proud of Troy’s successes
HOUSTON — No matter how this year’s World Series ends, a Snitker will get a championship ring.
This edition of the Fall Classic is a family affair with Atlanta Braves manager Brian Snitker in the dugout opposite his son, Houston Astros co-hitting coach Troy Snitker.
Close their whole lives, they are rivals as the teams took the field Tuesday night for Game 1.
“Quite honestly, tomorrow at 7:09 or whatever, he’s going to want to kick my (butt),” dad said Monday.
But on the eve of the game, the elder Snitker still found time to play the role of proud papa when talking about his son’s success.
“I kind of validated the fact that maybe I did something right, the way he turned out,” he said. “He’s a heck of a young man.”
And later Monday the family got together one last time before they had to go their separate ways for the start of the series.
“We talked about this last night at dinner, how we needed to just enjoy this,” Brian Snitker said. “You’re never guaranteed this. Who knows when you’re going to get back. Enjoy it and relish in it.”
Troy Snitker grew up in clubhouses and dugouts, following his father as he toiled as a minor league skipper for most of his childhood. Brian taught his son so much during that time, but as he watched him bounce around teams from Macon, Georgia, to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, it was not what he said, but what he did that served as the most important lesson.
“Just his work ethic,” the 32-year-old Snitker said. “I think that’s the biggest thing that I’ve taken away from him, being able to watch him from a young age at the ballpark. He’s so consistent, hard working. He’s the same guy every day when you’re in the clubhouse with him.”
The 66-year-old Snitker spent 15 seasons a manager for various Braves’ farm teams before working as Atlanta’s third base coach from 2007-13. He was the manager of the Triple-a Gwinnett Braves from 2013 until becoming the big league club’s interim manager when Fredi González was fired in May 2016.
Brian got the job full-time in 2017. Troy Snitker coached in college for a bit before joining the Double-a Corpus Christi Hooks as their hitting coach in 2018. He spent just one season there before moving on to work for Houston’s major league club.
Brian Snitker is impressed with the way his son has incorporated the things he learned about baseball growing up with his dad with the newer side of the sport.
“I love the fact that he’s meshed (things),” Brian Snitker said. “Because I raised him in a dugout, on a bus, on the field a long, a long time ago before analytics were ever invented.”