Aumont Highlights Canadian Crop

By Bob Elliott
June 5, 2007

TORONTO—The first time the light went on for righthander Phillippe Aumont was at the East Coast Showcase last August. A coach came into the clubhouse at the showcase in Wilmington, N.C., and said it was "nice to have a first-rounder on our team."

"I asked, who?" Aumont said.

Teammates Cam Gray and Colin Buckborough, who played with Aumont on Canada's national youth team, looked at him.

"It's not me, is it?" Aumont said. "Everyone told me I'd get drafted. I had no idea how high until that day."

Now, Aumont's name figures to be up in lights June 7. He is the 6-foot-7 tip of a large iceberg of hard-throwing high schoolers residing in America's attic. No less than 11 high schoolers were clocked at 90 mph this spring.

"Unheard of," said one veteran Canadian scout. "The most I've seen in my 35 years. Usually there are three or four."

The next-best prospect is righthander Kyle Lotzkar, of Tsawwassen, B.C., and he too is expected to go in the first two rounds. Other high-velocity arms on Canada's west coast include Evan Hildenbrandt of Abbotsford, Mitch Hodge of Vancouver, and Travis Nevashonoff of Castlegar.

 Ontario's 90-plus club consists of Scarborough's Leslie Williams, Brampton's Kyle Benoit, North York's Geoff Burke, Buckborough of Niagara Falls, and Toronto's Gray. In Quebec, Guillaume Leduc has hit 90 in addition to Aumont.

Aumont impressed at Wilmington and in other showcase events last summer, and again at Disney's Wide World of Sports in April with Team Canada. His most impressive outing may have come in Cuba prior to last summer's World Junior Championship, when he threw six scoreless against Cuba.

Lazaro Valle, a former Cuban star, said, "That kid is a major league pitcher. He is mucho bueno."

He threw at 93-95 mph this spring. "I saw Adam Loewen and Jeff Francis their first March outings in Florida," said one scout. "Aumont was better than either that day."

Scouts love the fact he has a mean streak as well. "He's as competitive as anyone as I've been around," said Les McTavish, former national team pitching coach.

But while Aumont was on the radar last summer, Lotzkar popped up this spring, gaining attention on his club team's Arizona trip. He pitches for coach Doug Mathieson, who runs the Langley Blaze travel team and whose son Scott reached the big leagues with the Phillies (but is currently injured).

Lotzkar worked four scoreless, fanning seven against Cochise (Ariz.) Junior College, and pitched three innings, striking out three against a Mariners extended spring team.

"It's been fun," Lotzkar said. "The pressure is mounting. I appreciate the tension. I'll look back on it as an exciting time."

Lotzkar has heard from B.C. natives Jeff Francis, who now pitches for the Rockies, former Rangers closer Jeff Zimmerman and Mariners farmhand Mike Saunders.

"Watching Loewen and Francis get drafted motivated me; it helped put B.C. on the map," Lotzkar said.

He said he has heard from scouts with nearly every major league team. "The scout from Oakland said they haven't been up here in three years," Lotzkar said.

In addition to a strong crop of talent, the good news for Canucks is that they no longer need the type of work visa that had been scarce in recent years, so that will not deter teams from selecting Canadian players.

The bad news is that clubs will no longer have 50 weeks to look at draft-and-follows with the new signing deadline of Aug. 15. Athletics righthander Rich Harden and Dodgers catcher Russell Martin are two recent examples of prominent Canadian draft-and-follows who eventually signed out of American junior colleges.

"It's really going to hurt," said one scout. "Scouts liked to draft Canadians and then keep an eye on them at a junior college."

—BOB ELLIOTT
Toronto Sun