(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photo by Alfred Cop)
  First professional victory for Taylor Clemensia
Nederlands
 FORT MYERS, Florida (USA) -
Taylor Clemensia has been credited with his first professional victory as a pitcher.
The 19-year old lefthander was the starting pitcher on Wednesday (August 10) for GCL Twins and threw the first five inings in a 5-2 win against GCL Orioles.
Last season, Clemensia played in 21 games for Vaessen Pioniers in the Dutch big league and pitched in five games as reliever, appearing in four innings.
His father Angelo Clemensia is the 1B Coach of the team from Hoofddorp.
...Taylor Clemensia makes his debut in the Dutch...
...big league in 2013 with HCAW... |
| (© Photo: Alfred Cop Fotografie) |
Taylor Clemensia made his debut in the Dutch big league on April 21, 2013 when he was the rightfielder for HCAW.
In that game, against Pioniers, he was 0-for-2 with a walk and strikeout.
It was to be his lone game at the highest level that season.
He then transfered to Pioniers after the season and played in 18 games for the main squad in 2014.
Clemensia signed a professional contract in May last year.
However, he made his professional debut this season on June 28 when he was the starting pitcher for the GCL Twins, which is the Rookie League-level team of the Minnesota Twins in the Gulf Coast League.
In his debut, he threw 3 2/3 inning and had a no-decision.
Hereafter, four more pitching appearances without a decision followed, including three starts.
On July 23, Clemensia threw the first five innings against the GCL Red Sox (Boston Red Sox), but again had a no-decision.
Clemensia then got three decisions in his next three assignments.
On July 29, he started and went 4 2/3 inning against the Red Sox and was the losing pitcher.
Clemensia struckout ten batters in that game and gave up only two basehits.
Both hits came in the fourth inning, resulting in two runs.
Clemensia then also was the losing pitcher in his next start, which came on August 5 when he threw five innings in another start against the Red Sox.
But on Wednesday, Taylor Clemensia was more successful.
At CenturyLink Sports Complex, the home of the Orioles in Fort Myers, he started against the GCL Orioles (Baltimore Orioles) and struckout seven batters in five innings.
He gave up three hits and two runs, but got come more run-support.
The lefthander left the mound with a 4-2 lead.
The Twins hold onto the lead, added another run and won 5-2.
And with that, Clemensia earned his first professional victory.
One of the two umpires in this game was Jennifer Pawol (at first base).
She is the lone female umpire at the moment in professional baseball.
In eight games so far, Clemensia has struckout 40 batters in 35 1/3 inning, but also walked 20.
He gave up only 17 basehits.
With the GCL Twins, the Amsterdam-born Clemensia is a teammate of another Dutch pitcher, Matz Schutte.
The 18-year old righthander from Almere is in his second professional year and his second with the GCL Twins.
So far this season, Schutte has pitched in relief in nine games and is 1-0 with 11 strikeouts in 14 1/3 inning.
Last year, Schutte was 2-2 with a 3.07 ERA in 14 games (two starts).
In November-December last year, Schutte was a member of Team Europe during the Asian Winter Baseball League in Taiwan.
Dutch infielder Ruar Verkerk also played for the GCL Twins in 2014 and 2015.
He was on the preliminary roster again for this season, but he was released in June before the start of the Rookie League-season.
Verkerk then returned to the Netherlands where he joined Curaçao Neptunus.
(August 11)
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