In June, Duke ace Marcus Stroman was drafted in the first round of the MLB Draft by the Toronto Blue Jays. On August 3rd, he entered his first Double-A baseball game.

Pitching for the NH Fishercats of the Eastern League, Stroman struck out the first batter he faced (former FSU outfielder Tyler Holt). He then proceeded to induce two straight ground outs to close out his first Double-A appearance. In that outing, he threw 12 pitches, eight for strikes.

His next appearance came on August 7th and he allowed a solo homerun to former GT player Tony Plagman. He also allowed two stolen bases.

Stroman‘s first victory came on August 10th. He only threw 13 of his 27 pitches for strikes (he walked two), but did not allow a hit or run.

His next two outings were of the scoreless variety (on August 14 and 17).

Stroman picked up another victory yesterday (August 20th), despite allowing a run. He walked the first two batters he faced and a wild pitch move the lead runner to third base. A sac fly scored the run, but he escaped further damage. The Fishercats scored a run to take the lead in the very next inning.

Stroman is pitching about every three to four days, as it looks like the Blue Jays are trying to keep him fresh and limit his innings after his huge workload at Duke.

The Fishercats are one game away from being eliminated from the Eastern League postseason, so I’m not sure if the plan is to promote Stroman to the big leagues when rosters expand on September 1st (the Blue Jays have fallen to last place in the American League East).