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Former Coughlin star Ray Black hasn’t pitched in more than two weeks for the Richmond Flying Squirrels (San Francisco’s Double-A affiliate), but the fireballer who reached 104 MPH with his fastball earlier this season, is still in the middle of a good run. He’s allowed just one run in his last 12 appearances for the Flying Squirrels with 21 strikeouts in 10 2/3 innings in that span after going through a tumultuous run before that.
Black recently told Flying Squirrels Insider in a video interview that his breakout is due to a few sessions with his pitching coach Steve Kline and former MLB All-Star closer Lee Smith, who racked up 478 career saves in 18 seasons.
“We went back and watched the video from when I first came back off my first surgery in 2014 when I was with Augusta our Low-A and I had a different set,” Black said in the video posted on YouTube. “And when I come set this year, my front foot had been a little more open causing me to get rotational. This is all mechanics and pitching talk for ‘I’m throwing the ball up.’ I was able to catch it on video with Kline, who caught it on tape from two years ago to help me. I was able to fix it and it’s helped me be more direct to home plate.”
For the season, the 26-year-old has a 1-4 record and six saves in seven chances and has an astonishing strikeout rate of 50 in just 29 innings.
Matt Wotherspoon
The Crestwood product was sent back to Double-A Trenton last week and struggled a bit in his first action in 10 days for his worst outing in Double-A this season.
Wotherspoon got in two games for the Thunder last week, but in his first outing, he gave up three hits and three runs in 1 2/3 innings against Portland.
Just two days later, the 24-year-old got in another game against the Sea Dogs and tossed a scoreless frame to pick up his fifth save of the season.
Over two levels with Scranton/Wilkes-Barre and Trenton, the righty has pitched in 25 games in the Yankees organization posting a 4-2 record with a 3.10 ERA. He’s struck out a total of 58 in 61 innings.
Mike Papi
The mild hitting streak for the former Tunkhannock standout came to an end after four games last week, but he started a new one on Friday night for the Double-A Akron RubberDucks.
Playing in the Eastern League, the outfielder has hit safely in five of his last seven games.
The 23-year-old is still enjoying the best month of his Double-A career batting .241 in July to raise his batting average on the season with Akron more than 30 points. He’s also smacked both of his Double-A homers this month while getting on base at a .400 clip.
His combined numbers between Double-A and Single-A in Cleveland’s organization have him now with nine longballs, a .220 batting average and 39 RBI. His OBP continues to be a huge part of his game posting an on base percentage of .357 drawing 58 walks in 84 games.