Tag: Tyler Fitzgerald

And Then There Were Four

And Then There Were Four

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The second half of the Pacific Coast Leage season came down to the wire on the final day as both the Round Rock Express and Reno Aces came into the day tied for first place with a record of 44-30. A win by Reno, or a loss by Round Rock would clinch the second half and playoff berth for the Aces who were facing the Aviators in Vegas. Round Rock was in Tacoma for their match up against the Rainiers. The Aces would lose their game by a score of 6-5 to the Aviators, snapping an eight-game winning streak, and leaving them in limbo to watch the outcome of the Round Rock game which was still only in the fourth with the Express up by a score of 3-2.

Hearts must have sunk in the Reno locker room after the game when the Express piled on seven runs in the fifth to extend the lead that they would not relinquish to go on and win the game by a score of 11-6 and clinch the second half title in the Pacific Coast League, and set the stage for the Pacific Coast League Championship against the Oklahoma City Dodgers.

And then there were four.

Earlier in the week Durham clinched their third straight playoff berth as the reigning Triple-A Champions will take on the Norfolk Tide, Triple-A affiliate of the Baltimore Orioles. The Tide have a strong lineup including Minor League Player of the year Jackson Holliday.

Round Rock also stocked up their roster this week by calling up this year’s fourth overall pick Wyatt Langford, and their top pitching prospect Jack Leiter who both could play a huge role in the playoffs against OKC.

The League Championship series start tonight in Oklahoma City, and Norfolk respectively as each team won the first have of their divisions. The winners of the best of three series will face off in Las Vegas on Saturday, September 30th. Will Durham be the first team to win FOUR Triple-A Championships, and three in a row?

Here in Sacramento, the River Cats had another losing season with a final record of 67-82 and 23.5 games out of first. The River Cats have not had a winning season since 2019, which has also been their only winning season since becoming an affiliate of the San Francisco Giants in 2015.

The most exciting player to watch this season, and team MVP was Tyler Fitzgerald who become the first River Cats player since Jarrett Parker in 2015 to have a 20/20 season in which he hit 20 home runs and stole 29 bases. He would end the season leading the River Cats in all offensive categories including the aforementioned home runs and steals, along with a .279 batting average, 72 runs scored, and 69 RBI. Tyler’s accomplishments didn’t go unnoticed by the Giants who called him up on September 21, a week after his 26th birthday. Through his first five games Tyler is hitting .250 with a double and a home run in only 16 at bats.

On the mound Nick Avila finished his amazing campaign with a 14-0 record, and an even 3.00 ERA, along with a 1.29 WHIP makes him one of the best pitchers in the Pacific Coast League this year.

Amazingly the River Cats had ten players make their Major League debut this season and that list included not only Fitzgerald, but Tristan Beck, Kyle Harrison, Marco Luciano, Luis Matos, Patrick Bailey, Ryan Walker, Keaton Winn, Casey Schmitt, and Wade Meckler.

The Giants potentially have the right pieces in place to be a solid team with this batch and some of the younger players in the lower levels of the Minor Leagues, but it sure has been rough for their fans. It will be exciting to see what 2024 brings for the both the River Cats, and the Giants, who will return for an exhibition game against Sacramento prior to the start of the season next spring at Sutter Health Park.

2024 marks the River Cats 25th Anniversary in Sacramento and for a long-time fan as myself, it makes me wonder if lightning can strike twice and the team can field a Champion as it did for their 20th Anniversary in 2019. Relive the magic of 2019 with my book, “Let’s Get it All” as I documented the unbelievable season that saw the River Cats go from their worst record in team history in 2018 to a National Championship one year late. Available at the River Cats’ On Deck Shop, and Amazon.

Pinky Swear

Pinky Swear

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The last time that we met, the second half of the season was kicking off and everything everywhere was a clean slate. The River Cats started off well enough going 6-6 into the All-Star break as they split two series with Reno and Salt Lake. Little did we know that the last game of that Salt Lake series where the Cats took the loss by a score of 3-0 would be when the wheels would come off for the second half of the season.

The OKC Dodgers started came into town for a short three game series against the River Cats and easily swept them behind two great pitching performances by Ryan Pepiot, and “Thor” Noah Syndergaard who outside of a first inning home run to Tyler Fitzgerald looked very much like his old self facing the River Cats going five complete innings and striking out six in the second game of the series.

The River Cats woes would continue when Tacoma came to town and took the first four games which extended the River Cats losing streak to a season high seven games. It wasn’t until game five of the series that River Cats were able to pull out a victory behind a Heliot Ramos walk off home run.

The scoring started early for both teams as the Rainiers took a 1-0 lead in the first before Isan Diaz hit a two-run home run in the bottom half of the inning to put the Cats on top. The score would remain the same until Randy Rodriguez would blow a save that allowed to Rainier to tie the game in the eighth before Ramos sent a ball to left center to end the game.

The River Cats would take the final game of series behind the pitching of Tristan Beck, and the glove and bat of Marco Luciano who hit his first Triple-A home run.

The next 18 games would find the River Cats going 5-13 against Albuquerque, Reno, and Las Vegas. While 12 of those games were on the road, the River Cats would find themselves in another five game losing streak, and losing five of six to Reno at home.

The River Cats are now tied with Sugarland (Triple-A affiliate of the Houston Astros) for the worst record in the Pacific Coast League at 14-25 here in the second half. If there’s any consolation over in the International League, the Charlotte Knights (Triple-A of the Chicago White Sox) have a lowly 6-33 record going into this week.

I do want to point out one thing for this second half and that has been the resurgence of the Las Vegas Aviators who were cellar dwellers in the first half of the season along with the other Oakland Athletics Minor League teams, but they have really turned things around and now lead the Pacific Coast League tied for first with the Tacoma Rainiers with a record of 24-15 which as of today is the best record in Triple-A baseball.

There have also been some bright spots along the way for Sacramento. Marco Luciano, and Wade Meckler who joined the River Cats just two weeks ago during the Reno series have both made their Major League debuts; I should say that Meckler was just called up last night and went 0-3 with a walk in his debut batting second against Tyler Glasnow and the Rays. Meckler had a meteoric rise to the Majors as he was drafted in the 8th round of the 2022 draft out of Oregon State. In 69 Minor League games in 2023 that have taken Wade from Eugune, OR (High-A), Richmond, VA (Double-A), and Sacramento, CA (Triple-A) Meckler has hit .379, and a .985 OPS with five home runs and 46 RBI.

Another bright spot has been Tyler Fitzgerald who now leads the River Cats in all offensive categories. Tyler is now batting .291, with 15 home runs, 51 RBI, and 20 stolen bases to boot. Will he be a 20/20 man this season? The River Cats have 36 games left, and off the top of my head I can’t remember if there has been a 20/20 player in team history. Tyler has always stood out to me from when I first saw him play for Salem-Keizer in the Northwest League. I went to watch the Volcanoes play Boise in 2019 so that I could interview Hunter Bishop and Alex Canario, but it was Tyler and Logan Wyatt who stood out that weekend. Logan is currently playing at Double-A Richmond.  

Tyler Fitzgerald – 2019 Salem Keizer Volcanoes

On the mound, Nick Avila is tied for the most wins in all of professional baseball with 13 at the time of this writing and has zero losses on the season. I know that wins don’t carry the same weight they once did, but it’s still cool as he has four wins more than the next pitcher closest to him in the PCL, and while he doesn’t qualify because of the minimum innings requirement he actually has a slightly better WHIP than the league leader in the PCL at 1.34 to Tacoma’s Darren McCaughan’s 1.35.

I had something happen to me a few weeks ago that I’ve never experienced and also was a first for the player involved. I was sitting in the first row of the Dugout Club seats at Sutter Health Park, and I was fiddling with my camera when a visiting player came up to me on his way to the on deck circle and asked how I was. I replied with a simple, I’m good, what about yourself to which he replied, “I need a knock” and we both laughed. He made some small talk with me while he was warming up on deck when we made a gentlemen’s bet over a pinky swear. The bet was to help motivate him to get that “knock” that he needed.

On the mound for the River Cats, Miguel Yajure.

First pitch was high and in, ball one. The next pitch was a changeup that missed high, ball two.

Yajure gets a curveball in for strike one. The count is now 2-1.

Slider, swing, drive, gone. 402 feet to dead center field.

I can usually keep my emotions in check when I’m at games but an audible “No f*cking way” rang out as I watched the ball sail over the centerfield fence for a two-run home run. As he stepped on home plate, he pointed at me with the biggest grin on his face and I laughed and applauded him. We officially introduced ourselves to each other later and that’s when he told me that nothing like that has ever happened to him. It was an experience that we can both share for years to come. A week later he was traded to another organization, and I wish him the best there and hope that he gets the opportunity to play in the Majors.