Minor league daily dish from BaseballAmerica

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Compiled by Kevin Goldstein, Chris Kline and Matt Meyers

June 27, 2005

Over the next few weeks, we'll be putting the spotlight on players who will be involved in this year's Futures Game on July 10 in Detroit. We hope to provide our readers with insights on as many players as possible as only Baseball America can.

For our first installment in the Futures Game Dish, we head to Florida, where high Class A Clearwater righthander Scott Mathieson might not be getting the results he'd like in terms of wins and losses--he's 0-2, 3.88 in 58 innings--but is stringing together quality start after quality start in the Florida State League.

Mathieson has played with fellow British Columbia natives Adam Loewen and Jeff Francis on Canadian national teams, but he went 16 rounds after them to the Phillies in the 2002 draft.

After going 2-9, 5.09 in his first two seasons, Mathieson made considerable progress last year and has built on that success this year. He's filling out his frame, and is now listed at 6-foot-3, 230 pounds. His fastball tops out at 96 mph, and he's consistently in the 92-93 range. And he's not like your average power pitcher with a big fastball/breaking ball repertoire. Mathieson relies on a fastball/changeup mix for the time being to get hitters out.

"He's a big, broad-shouldered guy that's starting to physically mature," Clearwater pitching coach Scott Lovekamp said. "And he's an animal workout-wise. He's built for endurance, and he has one speed. Everything he does is full-throttle.

"He's a young power pitcher--there's no question--but his changeup is ahead of his curveball right now. His curveball continues to get better, but he's still developing a feel for pitching. It's making gradual improvement."

In his last outing, Mathieson struck out 10, walked one and allowed one run against Sarasota--three of those strikeouts came on changeups; seven on fastballs. On paper, that might appear to be his best outing of the season, but Lovekamp goes back to a May 29 game against St. Lucie because he mixed in all his pitches for strikes.

Sometimes clubs are wary about sending young pitchers to the Futures Game, simply because they will face quality hitters with a lot more experience, but Lovekamp doesn't see that being an issue with Mathieson.

"He's really excited," Lovekamp said. "Going from an unknown guy from Canada to this is good for him no matter what happens. He'll be able to handle it."

But first things first. Mathieson will face Tampa tonight.

-- CHRIS KLINE

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