Tapia Continues To Roll, Six Shutout Innings In 1-0 St. Lucie Win

St. Lucie 1, Daytona 0

If you like good pitching as much as I do, then you can understand why I have little reason to dislike Domingo Tapia. The young hurler was dominant again on Sunday, where he tossed six shutout frames while allowing just two hits. He walked three and struck out four in what can only be looked at as yet another step in the right direction for the young man. Of course, I would love to see a few less free passes from Tapia as he improves.

He bounced back from a tough first inning where his catcher Albert Cordero bailed him out a little – with a great throw to catch Tim Saunders trying to steal second and an even better one to pick off Javier Baez to end the inning.

Tapia induced six groundouts in contrast to his four flyouts and four strikeouts, which is common for him in a good start. I’d like to say he is making strides in defining his breaking pitch this year, which is excellent news. He was removed after reaching his pitch count, right around 90 pitches, but he could definitely have gone another inning with the momentum that he picked up. Frank Francisco, Jim Fuller, and Chasen Bradford combined with Tapia for a team shutout. Francisco looked pretty good and his velocity looked to be in the low nineties out there, so he might be ready to blow a save in New York soon.

Unfortunately for Tapia’s win total, the St. Lucie offense was stifled by opposing starter Yeiper Castillo and the Mets did not manage to score a run while he was on the mound. They did pull out the win, however, on a walk-off RBI single by Matt Reynolds.