Baltimore Orioles pitching prospect Bundy draws crowd at Suns game

Nor was there the media attention that Strasburg commanded, Toms said.

Mike Fleagle, 35, of Martinsburg, W.Va., said he saw Harper and Strasburg play in Hagerstown last year.


“That why I am came today. I knew (Bundy) was going to be here, so I wanted to take a look at him,” Fleagle said.

Fleagle said he likes seeing big prospects come through Hagerstown.

Fleagle said Sunday was busier than he thought it would be, with lots of Orioles fans in attendance.

Still, he said Harper and Strasburg drew bigger crowds.

“I haven’t been here since I was 10,” said Clear Spring resident Guy Shepherd, 38.

Bundy was the only reason he went to Sunday’s game, and he recruited 16 friends and family members to join him, Shepherd said.

“I came for Bundy, to be honest,” said O’s fan Kevin DeLauter, 35, of Hagerstown. DeLauter said he saw Harper play in a couple of games last year, but he was more interested in seeing Orioles prospects than Nationals prospects.

DeLauter, who tries to make it to Suns games when the Delmarva Shorebirds — a Single A Orioles affiliate — are in town, said the crowd appeared larger than the average crowd at a Suns-Shorebirds game.

DeLauter’s son, Blake, 4, was attending his first Suns game on Sunday.

DeLauter said he talked to his son about Bundy, who was the Orioles’ top draft pick and fourth pick overall in the 2011 draft.

Blake will know when Bundy makes it to the big leagues that he once saw him pitch at Hagerstown, DeLauter said.

“We come to a lot of games, but that was a big reason we came today,” Scott Caron said of Bundy pitching. Caron, who brought his son, Tyler, 6, to Sunday’s game, said he went to a few extra games last year to see Bryce Harper.

Caron said he and his son met Bundy before the game.

Describing the pitcher as “super nice,” Caron said Bundy signed several autographs before the game.

Don Yesacavage, 52, of Hagerstown, said attendance had been pretty good at the three-day series with nice weather and, “Basically, two local teams playing,” he said.

“I didn’t really get the sense a lot of people came out to see Harper last year,” Yesacavage said.

Yesacavage said he grew up in Baltimore as an Orioles fan, but supports the Suns and watches the Nationals more as he is hosting three Suns players.

Kerry Jackson, 48, of Greencastle, Pa., also hosts a Suns player and said he would have been at Sunday’s game whether or not Bundy was pitching.

His buddies, O’s fans who were not at the Suns game, were texting him to see how Bundy was doing, Jackson said.

Suns General Manager Bill Farley said it’s difficult to compare fan turnout for Bundy and Harper because Harper played every day and Bundy, as a starting pitcher, would only play once every five games.