Indians minor league recap: Yandy Diaz, Francisco Mejia extend hit streaks

Not a bad day all around for the Indians affiliates. Almost everyone enjoyed a win, and a couple key prospects extended really long hitting streaks. The only real downside was the Mahoning Valley Scrappers, who fell fast and hard thanks to five straight errors to start the game.

Columbus Clippers 1, Indianapolis Indians 0

Box Score · Clippers improve to 61-49

Who needs Clint Frazier when you have Shawn Morimando? Despite getting outhit, 6-5, the Columbus Clippers came away with their 61st win of the season with a narrow victory.

Giovanny Urshela had the only multi-hit game of the day, as well as the only extra-base hit, but it was Jesus Aguilar who plated the winning run in the fourth inning.

Yandy Diaz's only hit of the game extended his hit-streak to 20 games, which would be the longest in the Indians organization if Jonathan Lucroy had any common sense.

Shawn Morimando, Perci Garner, and Shawn Armstrong combined to shut down the Indianapolis Indians offense, with 6.1 of those innings coming from Morimando himself. Armstrong earned his sixth save of the season and completed the inning without issuing a single walk, something he has been getting a lot better at recently. His walk rate on the season is at 15.5 percent, much higher than it should be, but in his last 10 games he has only walked four batters, compared to 16 strikeouts.

Lynchburg Hillcats 5, Potomac Nationals 4

Box Score · Hillcats improve to 69-38

Sorry, Yandy Diaz, the real hit streak king still resides with the Lynchburg Hillcats. Top Indians catching prospect Francisco Mejia recorded a hit in his 43rd-straight game yesterday which, if he was in the majors, would have him at the fourth all-time highest hit streak and just 13 shy of Joe DiMaggio's record set in 1941.

Mejia was far from the Hillcats batter to have a hit. Everyone except for Taylor Murphy and Tyler Krieger did as well, with Mark Mathias, Bobby Bradley, Yu-Cheng Chang, and Connor Marabell all adding two hits apiece. Bradley also belted a home run in the third inning, his 20th of the season and first since July 23.

The Hillcats offense as a whole did not draw a single walk in the game, but they only struck out six times.

Starting pitcher Sean Brady was given the win on the day, throwing 6.2 innings and striking out seven with zero walks. This marks the seventh-straight start for Brady in which he has allowed two or fewer runs in six or more innings. Closer Trevor Frank recorded a four-out save with two strikeouts.

Lake County Captains 2, West Michigan Whitecaps 1

Box Score · Captains improve to 55-51

The Lake County Captains tested their fans love of minor league baseball with a four-hour game that was stuck at 1-1 for six innings. Luckily, they came out on top thanks to a solo shot from Jose Medina to lead off the 12th.

Captains batters struck out 12 times on the day and walked just twice. Three of those strikeouts came from Jodd Carter, who also had the team's only other run batted in when he opened the scoring in the second inning. Carter has bounced around between Low-A, Class-A, and High-A this season, but he has hit just about everywhere. In 35 total games this season he is slashing .276/.343/.409.

Micah Miniard, making his second start in Class-A, pitched a strong 5.1 innings, allow one earned run and striking out six.

Mahoning Valley Scrappers 2, Williamsports Crosscutters 3

Box Score · Scrappers fall to 18-24

The Mahoning Valley Scrappers were down, 0-3, before they even got up to bat and were unable to recover.

The Scrappers managed just five hits as a team, two coming from catcher Logan Ice. Ice had a slow start to his professional career, but over his last 10 games he has gone 10-for-31 and he has a .374 on-base percentage this season thanks to 18 walks.

Aaron Civale was the starting pitcher of the game, and on the mound when three runs crossed the plate, but he finished the game with no earned runs. The Williamsport Crosscutters scored thanks to a fielding error to get the runner on base, a throwing error on a pickoff attempt, a fielding error on a sacrifice bunt, a fielding error on another hit, and a fielding error in right field. If that's too confusing, here's what it boils down to: five straight errors. Civale got out of the inning with a double play and a ground out.

Randy Valladares pitched three innings and struck out six batters in that time.

AZL Indians 2, AZL Angels 3

Box Score · Indians fall to 22-12

Despite 11 hits, the AZL Indians still lost to the AZL Angels, 3-2.

The top of the Indians lineup -- Connor Capel, Jorma Rodriguez, and Jose Vincente -- combined to go 6-for-14 with two doubles, but only one of those hits plated a run. Nolan Jones, who is normally a third baseman but playing shortstop yesterday, was 1-for-3 and continues to hit well in the Rookie League. In 14 games so far he is slashing .341/.500/.364.

Francisco Perez pitched six innings, allowing three earned runs off of five hits. He also struck out four batters to just one walk.

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The Akron RubberDucks and DSL Indians had scheduled off days.