News Release, Southern Maryland Blue Crabs
Waldorf, MD – The Atlantic League of Professional Baseball announced its Player of the Year awards on Thursday afternoon. The Southern Maryland Blue Crabs won two of the three league awards. Daryl Thompson was named the ALPB Pitcher of the Year and Edwin Garcia was named the Rawlings Gold Glove Defensive Player of the Year.
For Thompson, this award has been a long time in the making. The La Plata native just concluded his 17th season of professional baseball and his eighth with the Blue Crabs.
This season he set career highs in wins, strikeouts, and innings pitched, and led the Atlantic League in all three of those categories. His 162 strikeouts were the second-most in a single season in Atlantic League history and his 15 wins are tied for the sixth-most in Atlantic League history.
Additionally, this season he slid into fifth place in league history in career ALPB wins, third in innings pitched, and second in strikeouts.
It was a storybook season for Thompson. The right-hander picked up his 100th professional win, tossed his 2,000th career inning, and struck out his 1,500th batter.
Incredibly, Thompson also picked up eleven straight wins in eleven straight starts in 2019, a feat that has only been bested 12 times in the MLB since 1908, and three times since 1968. Thompson swept the ALPB league pitching awards this season, being named the starting pitcher on the league Post-Season All-Star Team, the Defensive Pitcher of the Year, and the league Pitcher of the Year. In response to these awards, Thompson said “I never focus on my numbers, I knew I did pretty well but I didn’t think I led in everything because of the caliber of pitchers in and out of this league. I just want to say thank you to the ALPB and the Blue Crabs organization along with all of my friends and family for all of the support. THANK YOU!”.
The MLB veteran is the fourth Blue Crabs pitcher to be named ALPB Pitcher of the Year in franchise history, and the first since Gaby Hernandez in 2017.
As for Edwin Garcia, winning the Rawlings Gold Glove Defensive Player of the Year is not new territory, as he also won the award in 2018. He is fresh off being named to his third consecutive ALPB Red White and Blue All-Defensive Team and continues to flash his leather every single day.
The Venezuela native is the first to ever win the award in back-to-back years and the first to win the award multiple times since the introduction of the Rawlings Gold Glove Defensive Player of the Year in 2015. For the second consecutive season, the sure gloved Garcia led ALPB shortstops in fielding percentage. Much like Thompson, Garcia swept the league Post-Season awards for his position, being named to the Post-Season All-Star Team, the Red White and Blue All-Defensive Team, and now this fine honor.
Upon learning of the award, Garcia was humbled, saying “WOW. Seriously, I’m so happy. Thank you all for everything.”