Home Down on the Farm: UVA alum Zach Messinger gets start against Richmond in opener
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Down on the Farm: UVA alum Zach Messinger gets start against Richmond in opener

Chris Graham
baseball
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UVA Baseball alum Zach Messinger got the start for Somerset, the Double-A affiliate of the New York Yankees, in a 5-4 win over the Richmond Flying Squirrels in the teams’ 2024 season opener on Friday.

Messinger, a 13th-round pick by the Yankees in the 2021 MLB Draft, was 5-3 with a 4.42 ERA in three seasons at Virginia, in 51 appearances, 11 starts.

His win-loss record in the minors is, you know, not good – 2-18 – but the underlying numbers are fine.

In 54 appearances, 38 starts, across the past three seasons, Messinger has a 4.25 ERA, 1.35 WHIP, and 11.2 K/9.

In Friday’s opener, Messinger, the #23 prospect in the Yankees farm system, per MLB.com, allowed four runs, but only one of them was earned, on four hits in five and two-thirds innings, striking out five and walking one.

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In Fredericksburg, Jarlin Susana, the #10 prospect in the Washington Nationals farm system, per MLB.com, gave up an unearned run in three innings of work in the FredNats’ 4-2 win over the Delmarva Shorebirds in the season opener for the A teams on Friday.

Susana allowed two hits and struck out four in his first outing of the 2024 season.

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Down in Charlotte, the Norfolk Tides scored 10 in the first, but then went scoreless until the top of the 10th, getting the go-ahead run on an Errol Robinson RBI single to steal the 11-10 win.

Heston Kjerstad, the #4 prospect in the Baltimore Orioles farm system, had a three-run homer in the win, his sixth of the season, and Kyle Stowers also hit his sixth homer of the season for the Tides, a two-run shot in that big first inning.

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Chris Graham

Chris Graham

Chris Graham is the founder and editor of Augusta Free Press. A 1994 alum of the University of Virginia, Chris is the author and co-author of seven books, including Poverty of Imagination, a memoir published in 2019. For his commentaries on news, sports and politics, go to his YouTube page, TikTok, BlueSky, or subscribe to Substack or his Street Knowledge podcast. Email Chris at [email protected].