While Gabriel Ynoa took home this week’s honors as MMN Pitcher of the Week, his teammate Luis Cessa has been named the South Atlantic League Pitcher of the Week.

Cessa turned in his best outing of 2013 his last time out on the mound, which was this past Saturday at Kannapolis. The Intimidators were the ones getting intimidated by the 6’3″ right-hander, as he threw 7.2 innings of shutout ball, allowing only two hits on no walks, and 10 strikeouts.

It was the fourth time this season Cessa lasted through a start without walking a hitter, while his 10 punch outs and 7.2 innings pitched were season-highs. After allowing six earned runs on 11 hits in five innings pitched on May 19th against Augusta, he’s gotten himself on track. In those last two appearances, Cessa has thrown 14.1 innings and allowed one run on nine hits, two walks, and 17 strikeouts. That’s a pretty good run he’s starting for himself.

With this 7.2 inning performance on Saturday, he’s already started off the month of June better than May was. In four starts last month, Cessa went 0-1 with a 5.96 ERA, allowing 31 hits and seven walks in 22.2 innings pitched.

Congratulations to Luis on this wonderful honor! Even though Rainy Lara is not in the Sally League any longer to pick up more pitcher of the week honors, his teammates seem to be doing just fine taking care of that duty for him.