(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photos by Henk Seppen)
  Tom de Blok still waits for first victory; Donny Breek won once
Nederlands
  LAKELAND / FORT MYERS, Florida (USA) -
Dutch Pitcher Tom de Blok is in his third professional season in the organization of the Detroit Tigers.
This year, he plays in Single-A Advanced, is used as a starting pitcher, but has not yet been credited with a win.
Donny Breek, another Dutch pitcher, is pitching in his second season in Rookie League for the Minnesota Twins.
He also is a starter and has won one game.
Righthanded pitcher Tom de Blok made his professional debut in 2017 playing in Single-A.
He then pitched in 23 games (11 as starter) for West Michigan Whitecaps and was 4-2 with a 2.87 ERA and 73 strikeouts in 78 1/3 inning.
...Tom de Blok pitching for Amsterdam Pirates in 2016...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
Last year, the 23-year old De Blok pitched in eight games (all starts) for West Michigan and was 1-2 with a 3.15 ERA.
He also pitched in eleven games (all starts) for Lakeland Flying Tigers in the Florida State League (Single-A Advanced).
In these games, De Blok was 4-4 with a 5.98 ERA.
Overall last season,he pitched in 19 games and struckout 71 batters in 101 1/3 inning, but also gave up 109 basehits.
This season, De Blok again pitches for Lakeland.
So far, he pitched in 13 games (12 starts), but has yet to be credited with a win.
De Blok is 0-8 with a 3.80 ERA.
In 66 1/3 inning, the righthander struckout 61 batters, walked 31 and gave up 54 basehits and 31 runs.
De Blok started the season with an injury, then was activated on April 30.
He made his first start the next day and then pitched five innings against Florida Fire Fogs (Atlanta Braves) in a 2-0 loss.
De Blok gave up both runs and was the losing pitcher.
In the following five games, De Blok was the losing pitcher three more times.
On June 3, he gave up only one basehit in six innings against Palm Beach Cardinals (St. Louis Cardinals), but had a no-decision.
Lakeland won the game 2-0 in the eleventh inning.
The next day, De Blok was assigned to Connecticut Tigers (Single-A Short Season) for whom he didn't pitch.
It was a very brief stint with Connecticut, as he returned to Lakeland two days later.
De Blok made his next start for Lakeland on June 10 and had a no-decision, striking out seven batters in 5 2/3 inning.
After another no-decision on June 18, De Blok ended up as the losing pitcher in his next four starts.
He made his last start on Thursday (July 11) in a 3-2 loss against Bradenton Marauders (Pittsburgh Pirates).
De Blok struckout seven batters in six innings, giving up five hits (three doubles, one homerun) and three earned runs.
He gave up two runs in the first inning, then another in the fifth.
Lakeland scored its runs in the seventh and eighth inning.
The run in the seventh was scored on a homerun by second baseman Kody Clemens, the son of former Major League-pitcher Roger Clemens.
The righthander pitched in the Major League in 24 seasons for Boston Red Sox (1984-1996), Toronto Blue Jays (1997-1998), New York Yankees (1999-2003), Houston Astros (2004-2006) and again Yankees (2007).
He won the World Series twice and struckout 4,672 batters in his long career, third on the all-time list.
Lakeland is in fourth place in the North Division with a 29-36 record.
Tom de Blok made his debut in the Dutch big league pitching for HCAW in 2014 and was 0-3 in 17 games with 25 strikeouts.
Hereafter, he returned to L&D Amsterdam Pirates, where he had pitched in the second team before going to HCAW.
In 2015, he was 4-0 and in 2016, the righthander was 5-0, striking out 87 batters in these two seasons combined.
In his three Dutch seasons, he started only one game, while pitching in relief in 62 games.
...Donny Breek pitching for DSS in 2017...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
Donny Breek made his professional debut last season pitching for GCL Twins, the Rookie League-team of Minnesota Twins.
The 19-year old righthander then pitched in ten games (eight starts) and was 2-1 with a 2.89 ERA.
Breek struckout 41 batters in 37 1/3 inning.
This season, Breek again pitches for GCL Twins, which opened its season on June 24.
Breek was the starting pitcher the next day for the Twins in a 4-1 win against GCL Pirates (Pittsburgh Pirates).
The righthander threw the first four innings in which he struckout four batters and gave up four hits.
He left the mound in the top of the fifth with a 3-0 lead, but ended up with a no-decision, as he didn't throw five complete innings.
On Monday, July 1, he made his next start and this time, he was the winning pitcher.
Twins won 9-0 against GCL Rays (Tampa Bay Rays).
Breek pitched five innings and struckout three batters, while giving up only two basehits.
Last Monday (July 8), he made his next appearance.
Breek was then used as a closer, throwing the final two innings in a 4-1 loss against GCL Pirates.
Breek struckout five batters and gave up one basehit.
So far, Breek has pitched in three games.
He is 1-0 with an 0.82 ERA and struckout 12 batters in eleven innings.
GCL Twins is in fifth place of the South Division with a 6-8 record.
The team plays in the same division as the GCL Braves, which is the team of another Dutch player, Denzel Bryson.
Donny Breek made his debut in the Dutch big league in 2016.
Pitching for DSS, he was 2-8 with a 7.51 ERA in twelve games and struckout 33 batters.
In 2017, the righthander was 1-3 with a 7.95 ERA in twelve games when he again pitched for DSS.
Last year, he threw two innings in one game for the Haarlem-based team before starting his professional career.
(July 12)
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