A left-hander with good movement on his pitches, this week’s Shorebird of the Week is starting pitcher Richard Zagone.
In Tuesday evening’s game against Hagerstown, Richard recorded 19 outs – of those 16 were from ground balls. It was an amazing performance as batter after batter for the Suns beat balls into the Perdue Stadium turf and watched helplessly as Shorebird infielders increased their assist totals and fielding percentage. While he didn’t record the win because Hagerstown tied the game after he left, Zagone silenced the Suns to the tune of just two hits.
Overall, the 2008 6th round draft pick out of the University of Missouri has made three starts thus far and sports just a 1-1 record but an outstanding 1.72 ERA and even better 0.89 WHIP. Less than one batter an inning is reaching against the 22 year old Illinois native.
It’s seemingly a continuation of the magic Zagone had last year with Aberdeen, where he dominated the NY-Penn League with a 7-1 record and allowed just 14 walks and 57 hits in 65 1/3 innings of work, amassing a solid 2.89 ERA. Richard may be a pitcher who only stays here for a short time as he’s shown mastery of two levels thus far in his short career.
