Burrows' hitless effort earns weekly award

Beau Burrows didn't get to finish his no-hitter, but he did score an award for his brilliant work.

The No. 4 Tigers prospect was named Eastern League Pitcher of the Week on Monday after tossing six hitless innings Saturday against New Hampshire. The 20-year-old right-hander struck out eight and walked two in Erie's 11-0 win.

"It felt so unbelievable," Burrows told MiLB.com after the victory. "I wanted to come out for the seventh inning, but I came back to the dugout and they said I was done due to my innings limit. I was a little upset about it, but they gotta do what they gotta do, so I respect their decision. It was just fun to go out there and pitch."

Burrows, the Tigers' first-round pick in 2015, threw 83 pitches in his second straight win and has whiffed 18 in his last two starts spanning 12 innings. Saturday's performance marked the third time in four starts that he's struck out at least eight batters. He has 126 K's in 120 1/3 innings this year across two levels.

• View the Player of the Week winners »

"It's super-important to me, once you can establish your fastball down and away, you can pretty much throw anything you need to. I feel like what made my off-speed pitches better was keeping the fastball down in the zone," Burrows said. "Once I got that down, it was pretty fun to pitch today."

Burrows began the season with Class A Advanced Lakeland, where he went 4-3 with a 1.23 ERA in 11 starts. He struck out 62 in 58 2/3 innings before getting promoted to Erie on June 5. He's allowed three earned runs or fewer in nine of his 12 starts for the SeaWolves and turned in a pair of 10-strikeout efforts on July 27 and Aug. 6.

Saturday's start was perhaps the most dominant of his career -- he held South Bend to one hit over six scoreless innings June 3, 2016, for Class A West Michigan.

"It was definitely a dominant performance," said Erie pitching coach Willie Blair. "It was probably the most consistent he's been with executing pitches. He located the fastball down in the zone early and on the edges. He then was able to elevate it late.

"It seemed like his fastball had an extra gear when he got to two strikes," Blair added. "He elevated it and it had a little extra life on it. It was probably the most consistent his breaking stuff has been since I've had him."

Below is the complete list of Minor League Pitchers of the Week for Aug. 7-13:

League	Player	Team	MLB	Stats
International	Steven Brault	Indianapolis	PIT	2-0, 0.00 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 14 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 5 BB, 7 K
Pacific Coast	Jake Buchanan	Reno	ARI	1-0, 1.38 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 13 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 6 K
Eastern	Beau Burrows	Erie	DET	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 6 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 8 K
Southern	Jose Lopez	Pensacola	CIN	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 1 SHO, 7 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 7 K
Texas	Enyel De Los Santos	San Antonio	SD	1-0, 1.13 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 8 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 7 K
California	Garrett Williams	San Jose	SF	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 6 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 HBP, 2 BB, 8 K
Carolina	Brock Hartson	Lynchburg	CLE	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 6 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 5 K
Florida State	Ramon Santos	Palm Beach	STL	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 7 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 7 K
Midwest	Alfred Gutierrez	West Michigan	DET	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 7 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 11 K
South Atlantic	Max Duval	Greensboro	MIA	2-0, 0.64 ERA, 2 G, 2 GS, 2 CG, 1 SHO, 14 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 16 K
New York-Penn	Juan De Paula	Staten Island	NYY	0-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 6 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 4 BB, 5 K
Northwest	Kevin McCanna	Hillsboro	ARI	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 0 GS, 6 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 5 K
Appalachian	Evan Guillory	Johnson City	STL	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 7 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 8 K
Pioneer	Robert Garcia	Idaho Falls	KC	1-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 G, 1 GS, 5 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 6 K