Four Durham Bulls Headline IL All-Star Roster
Four Durham Bulls have been named to the International League All-Star team, the league announced today. OF Mikie Mahtook, INF Wilson Betemit, RHP Merrill Kelly and LHP Mike Montgomery will all represent the Bulls in front of their hometown crowd on July 16 at the DBAP under the watch of Durham skipper Charlie Montoyo, who heads the IL squad.
Mahtook, who is in just his third professional season, leads the IL with 25 doubles and 37 extra-base hits, while ranking fifth in the league with a .316 batting average. The 31st overall pick in the 2011 draft has now been named to his league's midseason All-Star team every season of his professional career, after earning Florida State League honors in 2012 as a member of the Advanced-A Charlotte Stone Crabs and Southern League honors in 2013 when he roamed the outfield for the Double-A Montgomery Biscuits.
The 32-year-old Betemit makes his first IL All-Star team after appearing in the league from 2002-2004 and 2008-2009. The 2001 Futures Game selection leads the Bulls with 12 home runs, and has reached base safely in 58 of the 68 games he's appeared in this season as he ranks second on the team with 33 walks.
Kelly, who has bounced back and forth between the starting rotation and the bullpen this season, is 6-2 with a 3.16 ERA in 17 games, 11 of which have been starts. Of those 11 starts, he's allowed three earned runs or fewer in 10 of them, while the Bulls have posted an 8-3 record when he's on the hill. The 25-year-old's selection to the All-Star team is the first of his professional career.
Montgomery makes his league's All-Star team after a three-year hiatus, last earning All-Star honors in 2010 with Double-A Northwest Arkansas in the Kansas City minor league system. This season the southpaw is tied for third in the league with eight wins, already setting a personal career-high for wins in a single season. His most notable outing came back on April 26 against Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, when he tossed the first 8 1/3 innings of a combined no-hitter with reliever Brad Boxberger in front of a sellout crowd at the DBAP.
The reigning IL Manager of the Year, Montoyo will lead the IL squad for the second time in his career after piloting the 2010 All-Star team to a 2-1 victory. The eighth-year skipper of the Bulls is just nine wins shy of tying Bill Evers for the most managerial wins in Durham Bulls history.
Individual tickets for the Triple-A Home Run Derby on July 14 and Triple-A All-Star Game on July 16 are now on sale HERE at durhambulls.com, by phone at 919.956.BULL or at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park box office.