College Baseball Daily continues our countdown to the start of the 2014 college baseball season by checking in on the Top 100 Players in the country. We will be adding players day-by-day until we get to number one!
Number 31 on our Top 100 Countdown is Florida’s Karsten Whitson. The 6’4 right-handed pitcher from Chipley, Florida was selected by the San Diego Padres as the ninth overall pick of the 2010 MLB Draft.
Whitson had quite a breakout year as a freshman in 2011 as he earned a role in the Gator weekend rotation, starting 19 games. He finished the season with a record of 8-1 with an ERA of .240. In his 97.1 innings pitched, Whitson struck out 92 while holding opponents to a batting average of .235.
Following the 2011 season Whitson earned a variety of awards including being named to the SEC’s All-Freshman Team, being named a Freshman All-American and being chosen as Perfect Game’s National Freshman Pitcher of the Year.
During his sophomore season in 2012, Whitson made 14 appearances with 110 starts to go 4-0 on the year with an ERA of 3.51. In his 33.1 innings pitched, he struck out 20 batters. Following the 2012 season, Whitson spent the summer in Cape Cod playing for the Orleans Firebirds where he posted an ERA of 2.70.
From a scouting perspective, clearly Whitson had the attention of scouts straight out of high school as he was the ninth overall selection in 2010, but after electing to enroll at Florida where does he stand in the eyes of scouts now? His fastball is still the real deal as it touches around 97 and has fantastic sink. Another strong pitch in Whitson’s repertoire is his slider that sits in the mid 80s. Whitson dealt with shoulder issues during the 2013 season which didn’t allow him to pitch.
He was selected in the 37th round of the 2013 MLB Draft after the injury but decided to come back after not coming to terms with the Washington Nationals.
