Buffalo Bisons 2 | Columbus Clippers

Dylan Owen was an absolute mess to start the game. He walked four in the 1st inning, another in the 2nd, and even threw in a wild pitch to boot. He was throwing under 50% strikes through the first two innings. Considering how bad he started off, the rest of the game wasn’t too bad. Not a great start, but could have been much worse. Dale Thayer hasn’t been the same pitcher since his call up. He has gotten too fastball happy and needs to use that slider again.

It is depressing that outside of Lucas Duda the best player on the Bisons roster over the last month has been 37-year-old Luis Figueroa whom the Mets signed in mid-May. Figueroa has had a good track record in the minors so that part is no huge surprise, it is just a bit disappointing about the state of the Mets high minors.

Stars of the Game: 1. Jason Botts (1-for-3, HR, R, RBI, 2 K) (3pts) 2. Luis Figueroa (2-for-4, 2B, RBI) (3pts) 3. Michael Fisher (1-for-4, 2 K) (20pts)

St. Lucie Mets 7 | Jupiter Hammerheads 4

Surprise, surprise. Yet another dominating performance from Matt Harvey. It feels good to finally have a pitching prospect who is dominant (he has been more dominating then Jenrry Mejia because Mejia was rushed too quickly to see this type of success). After striking out two in the first inning, Harvey didn’t allow for a long relay in the bottom half of the inning to affect his performance. He went on to strikeout two batters in each of the next three innings and finish the game with eight strikeouts in five innings. The best part of his performance was that he was getting strikeouts with his fastball, curveball, and even change-up. Right now it is not looking like there is even one hole in his game.

The Mets capitalized on a defensive blunder by the Hammerheads in the first. They scored five runs in the inning and only one was earned. With two outs and two runs already across because of a Jefry Marte double, Wilmer Flores blooped a ball into center field to score Marte and then Cesar Puello hit a long fly ball to dead center field to cap off the inning. Matt Den Dekker‘s power surge continued with an absolute bomb that was estimated to have gone over 400 ft. Considering the ballpark he is playing in and the power he has still shown it is time to stop looking at him as a weak slap-hitter and instead as a wiry guy with surprising pop. If the blast wasn’t good enough, Den Dekker came back in the next half inning to flash off his defense by making an incredible over the shoulder the catch and then making a perfect throw to gun the runner out at home who was trying to score from second on a single.

Stars of the Game: 1. Matt Harvey (W, 5 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 2 BB, 8 SO) (21pts) 2. Matt Den Dekker (1-for-3, HR,2 R, RBI, BB, K, assist) (39pts) 3. Cesar Puello (1-for-4, HR, R, 2 RBI, E) (21pts)

Savannah Sand Gnats 2 | Rome Braves 1

This is quiet possibly the best start Ryan Fraser has had all year. He pitched into trouble in the 3rd and 4th innings, but really bore down when he needed to. In the 3rd inning a hit by pitch set up a two on and no out situation that could have been very bad, but a heads up play by Blake Forsythe to cut off the lead runner at third base on a sac bunt helped out drastically. The runners proceeded to execute a double steal and get the desired result anyway, but Fraser induced a groundball to third base and the runner got gunned out trying to score and ended the threat. In the 4th inning a wild pitch by Fraser, to move the runners to second and third with one out, looked like it was going to be costly, but yet again Fraser buckled down, struckout the batter, and got the groundball to get out of the inning unscathed. Josh Edgin is still a beast.

It looks like the Aderlin Rodriguez bat is finally starting to heat up. After going 2-for-4 and driving in the game winning run with a single today, the Baby A-Rod has hits in five of his last six games and seven of his last nine. Five of those seven games have been multi hit games. Cory Vaughn picked up a triple to prevent his average from dipping below .300 and try to get him out of this June slump that has seen him bat .174.

Stars of the Game: 1. Ryan Fraser (W, 6 IP, 7 H, 0 R, 5 SO, HBP, WP, 8:2 GO:AO) (7pts) 2. Aderlin Rodriguez (2-for-4, R, RBI) (31pts) 3. Cory Vaughn (1-for-4, 3B, R) (36pts)