Our #5 starter, Waynesboro’s Tyler Bielamowicz, threw the best game the Valley saw all year. On July 15th at Front Royal, Houston’s utility player entered the bottom of the 9th inning with the rarest of feats in his sights: he had a perfect game through 8.
Alas, it was not to be, as the inning started with an error, and Tyler walked Spencer Packard three batters later, but he was able to finish off a no-hitter and shutout. After his 112 pitches, Tyler’s line was 9 innings, 0 hits, 0 runs, 1 walk, and 15 strikeouts. That comes out to a 100 game score- the best in the league in 2018 by a pretty far margin. After the game, Zeke Mitchum, Front Royal’s coach, said, “We couldn’t touch him.”
His stats for the entire summer:
| Way | ERA | W | L | G | GS | IP | H | R | ER | BB | K | B/AVG | WHIP | BB/9 | K/9 |
| 2018 | 3.07 | 1 | 2 | 5 | 5 | 26.3 | 16 | 12 | 9 | 13 | 35 | 0.176 | 1.103 | 4.4 | 12.0 |
Of pitchers on this list, Tyler finished 7th in strikeouts, 3rd in batting average against, 8th in WHIP, and 2nd in K/9. He also hit for the Generals; he slashed 228/363/367 in 79 regular season ABs, and was named 2nd team All-Valley at utility.
In the summer of 2017, he played in the New England Collegiate Baseball League with the Winnipesauke Muskrats, where he went 0-2, 1.69 in 5 1/3 innings, and hit 304/401/478 in 115 at-bats.
Tyler has also pulled double duty for Houston in his college career. First, his pitching stats:
| Hous | ERA | W | L | G | GS | IP | H | R | ER | BB | K | WHIP | BB/9 | K/9 |
| 2017 | 5.06 | 0 | 0 | 5 | 0 | 5.0 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 1.200 | 5.4 | 9.0 |
| 2018 | 11.00 | 0 | 2 | 6 | 2 | 9.0 | 13 | 13 | 11 | 8 | 6 | 2.333 | 8.0 | 6.0 |
He’s hit more than he’s appeared on the mound:
- In 2017, he hit 267/388/384 in 86 at-bats
- In 2018, he slashed 309/449/456 in 136 ABs
Both seasons, he was named American Athletic Conference All-Academic, made the American Championship All-Tournament Team in 2017, and also made the NCAA Chapel Hill Regional All-Tournament Team after 3 home runs and 7 RBIs in 2018.
Honestly, Tyler remind me a bit of a former Harrisonburg Turk named Scott Cousins, a two-way player for San Francisco who is probably best known for running over Buster Posey in a home plate collision.
Tyler and/or a major league organization will most likely have a decision to make about his future- on the mound, or at the plate?
Congratulations on your excellent summer, Tyler!
