By Ken Jackson
Sports Writer

Baseball seasons are long. Like marathons, they aren't summarized in the first days, or steps.

Osceola High alum Alex Burgos will be running at the end of the this season, with his pitch repertoire in tow.

After bicep tendonitis slowed the start of his first full professional baseball season, the 20-year-old has emerged as the most consistent starter on the West Michigan Whitecaps, the Class A Midwest League affiliate of the Detroit Tigers.

The Tigers drafted Burgos in the fifth round of the 2010 First Year Player Draft, right after pitching the State College of Florida in Bradenton to the National Junior College Athletic Association World Series.

Calling the time he spent shut down in March and April due to the tendonitis “a blessing,” the lefty is 6-3 with a 1.98 ERA in 11 starts with West Michigan, with 68 strikeouts in 63 innings. Opponents have hit .182 off him.

“While I was shut down I'd feel good, but they'd say I had to wait out my time,” Burgos said. “When I came back, it's the best and strongest I've ever felt. The rehab was a key to my success.”

The lefty, who made eight appearances for the Gulf Coast League Tigers in Lakeland last season after the draft, pitched in three extended extended spring training games this May before going to Michigan.

Unfazed about pitching in a higher-level league right after rehabbing an  injury, Burgos gave up one run in five innings to win his Class A debut on June 10. His next start was a hard-luck defeat in a 1-0 loss when he allowed only three hits in seven innings.

“The first game I was really nervous and I started out a little wild, but I settled down and it was one of my better outings,” he said. “Moving up means you'll see a great hitter one through nine in the lineup who can hurt you. It's helped me focus on every pitch.”

He followed that loss with wins in four of his next six starts. Numbers-wise, his best start thus far may have come on Aug. 2 on a hot, humid night in Dayton, Ohio, when he struck out 10 Dragons in a 9-6 Whitecaps win. Burgos retired 17 of the first 19 batters he faced and took a one-hit shutout into the seventh inning, eventually going 6 1/3 innings and allowing two runs on four hits.

He said the biggest adjustment to make at the pro level is keeping an even keel.

“Once I started doing well, my standards have gone up, and I want to do better,” Burgos said. “I just come to the ballpark every day, ready to go, and control what I can control.”

The Kissimmee native pitched exclusively in Florida until this year. He struck out 207 in 144 innings at Osceola and went 11-0 his senior year, 2008. He played two years for SCF in Bradenton, going 13-1 with a 1.42 ERA the last year to become the Suncoast Conference Pitcher of the Year while helping the Manatees win their 13th championship.

After all that, you'd think Burgos would feel some culture shock in Michigan, and miss Florida. He's actually found it quite familiar.

“Lake Michigan is close by, and there's a beach,” he said. “My dad and girlfriend have visited. But I'm living my dream doing this, and it's awesome. We have 8,000 fans some nights and they treat us great. I spend as much time as I can signing autographs.”

Jim Murphy, Burgos' coach at OHS and briefly in a wood-bat league in the Midwest just before the 2010 draft, said the lefty is progressing fine.

“I saw him here in extended spring, he pitched like four and two-thirds (innings) and struck out 10, he really looked outstanding,” Murphy said.

What is remarkable for Burgos ties back in a way to Murphy. Burgos is one of nine players off the Kowboys' 2008 district champion team to still be playing organized baseball.

Burgos and Jose Dore, who transferred after his sophomore year at OHS to Orlando's First Academy and was drafted in the ninth round by the San Diego Padres last year, are playing pro ball.

The others (B.J. Zimmerman, Reuben Marrero, Majer Entabi, Cody Ortega, Dylan Dillard, Carlos Guzman, Zach Hubbard and Jean Maldonado) are in various points of their college baseball careers.

“Some of those guys surprised me, but I'm not surprised by most of them,” Murphy said. “What they all had in common is that they're not afraid to put work in to improve and compete.

“Wherever they are, if they believe in who is leading the program, they'll do well.”

Burgos believed in those guys, too, and still does.

“Yes, we had some talent on that team. It was a great team,” he said. “We always get together whenever we're all back in Florida.”