Reds' Wynne racks up Pitcher of Week award

You won't find many 26-year-olds pitching at the Rookie Advanced level, and the ones you might come across would likely have an injury story to share. Randy Wynne has a whole different tale to tell.

The former independent league pitcher leaned on third strikes during a superlative Aug. 19-25 stretch for Rookie Advanced Greeneville, striking out 25 batters over two eight-inning starts to earn Appalachian League Pitcher of the Week honors. Perhaps more impressively, Wynne did so efficiently, walking just one batter during those 16 innings and not crossing the 100-pitch mark in either outing.

Wynne's path to this point was unorthodox. Undrafted out of Missouri Baptist in 2015, he pitched for the Birmingham-Bloomfield Beavers in the United Shore Professional Baseball League for two seasons before joining the Evansville Otters of the Frontier League in 2018. The Reds signed him in June, three months after his 26th birthday, and sent him to Greeneville.

• View the Offensive Player of the Week winners »

"I was kind of a career indy ball guy," Wynne told MiLB.com. "I'd never played affiliated baseball before. And I'm getting up there in age, at least for a guy that had never played affiliate. So being 26 in indy ball, I didn't really know if that shot would ever come. ... I'm just happy to be here."

After he spent almost seven weeks working out of the bullpen in Greeneville, Wynne made two appearances at Class A Dayton before moving back to the Appy League on Aug. 14. He made one lengthy appearance out of the 'pen (7 2/3 innings) before earning his second career start Aug. 20, and he responded by striking out 17 over eight one-hit innings in a 2-0 win over Burlington, which included an immaculate inning in the first. His follow-up outing wasn't on that level, but he again spanned eight innings and allowed three runs on eight hits and one walk while whiffing eight.

"That's definitely a career high," Wynne said of his 17 strikeouts. "I've had a couple other pretty good games in my life, some complete-game shutouts and stuff like that, but not with that many strikeouts. I'm not usually a high strikeout guy. [Tuesday] might've been the peak."

Wynne entered that Aug. 20 start with 32 strikeouts over 43 2/3 frames, but he now has 57 in 59 2/3 innings across three levels with an astounding 57-to-2 strikeout-to-walk ratio. His recent performances even had teammates talking about pitching at a level more befitting his age.

"They were making jokes about me starting in Cincinnati next game," Wynne said. "I don't know about any of that, but [it] felt pretty good."

Regardless of how high up the ladder Wynne climbs from here, he'll always be able to look back on his first two-start week in affiliated baseball with a feeling accomplishment. And who knows? There could be more to this story that's yet to be written.

Below is the complete list of Minor League Pitchers of the Week for Aug. 19-25:

League	Player	Team	MLB	Stats
International	Corey Oswalt	Syracuse	NYM	2-0, 1.42 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 12 2/3 IP, 9 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 7 K
Pacific Coast	Parker Dunshee	Las Vegas	OAK	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 11 2/3 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 1 HBP, 1 BB, 15 K
Eastern	Rony Garcia	Trenton	NYY	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 10 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 HBP, 4 BB, 14 K
Southern	Cory Abbott	Tennessee	CHC	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 10 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 9 K
Texas	Brett Conine	Corpus Christi	HOU	1-0, 0.90 ERA, 2 G, 1 GS, 10 IP, 10 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 1 HBP, 3 BB, 9 K
California	Austin Hutchison	Modesto	SEA	2-0, 0.75 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 12 IP, 10 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 HBP, 6 BB, 13 K
Carolina	Andrew Politi	Salem	BOS	0-0, 0.00 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 9 IP, 0 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 10 K
Florida State	Paul Richan	Lakeland	DET	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 8 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 7 K
Midwest	Robinson Ortiz	Great Lakes	LAD	2-0, 0.64 ERA, 2 G, 1 GS, 14 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 13 K
South Atlantic	Josh Maciejewski	Charleston	NYY	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 8 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 7 K
New York-Penn	Enmanuel Solano	State College	STL	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 8 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 HBP, 2 BB, 5 K
Northwest	Tyler Holton	Hillsboro	ARI	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 6 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 11 K
Appalachian	Randy Wynne	Greeneville	CIN	1-1, 1.69 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 16 IP, 9 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 1 BB, 25 K
Pioneer	Pedro Zorrilla	Missoula	ARI	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 2 G, 1 GS, 6 1/3 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 7 K