Matt ‘Tugboat’ Wilkinson is your favorite baseball player’s favorite player. The 21-year-old pitcher made history on Wednesday night with a remarkable performance on the Single-A level.
He struck out 15 of 19 batters faced in six hitless frames!
Wilkinson was selected in the 10th round of the 2023 MLB Draft by the Guardians. Initially committed to Arizona State, the Vancouver-native chose to forgo two additional years of eligibility on the collegiate level and turned pro shortly after being named as the National Junior Collegiate Athletic Association D1 Pitcher of the Year.
It is going to be very hard for Cleveland to keep him where he is if he continues dominating like he has through his first four starts of the 2024 MiLB season. Wilkinson is 2-0 with a 0.44 ERA. If that was not impressive enough, he struck out 41 batters in just 20.2 innings!
Tugboat Wilkinson is an ace.
The 6-foot-1, 270-pound (!!) lefty recorded 15 of those strikeouts on Wednesday.
Tugboat mowed down the first seven batters of the game, and did not allow a single hit.He capped the night by sitting down the side in the sixth. The Lynchburg Hillcats defeated the Myrtle Beach Pelicans behind his six scoreless innings.
15 K's in 6 hitless frames 🤯
— Minor League Baseball (@MiLB) April 25, 2024
What a performance by Matt "Tugboat" Wilkinson!@CleGuardians | @LynHillcats pic.twitter.com/7XWOda2A3H
Wilkinson became the fifth MiLB pitcher to strikeout at least 15 batters without allowing a hit since 2005.
Lynchburg is an eight-time Carolina League champion. If Tugboat sticks with the team through the rest of this year, it is very possible that the Hillcats could add a ninth title to their resume. As we saw on Wednesday, hitters don’t know what to do when an almost-300-pound fireballer is throwing nasty cheddar. They are completely frozen or forced to chase the stinky cheese and simply cannot keep up.
Lynchburg’s season will continue through the first week of September so there is plenty of time to catch a game. However, if you want to see Tugboat, you better get there soon before he is called up!