Clement looks forward to playing in the pros

Jeff Clement is excited about his upcoming professional baseball career but would like to delay it for a couple of weeks. The Marshalltown native is a junior catcher at U-S-C and on Tuesday was chosen by the Seattle Mariners with the third pick in Major League Baseball’s draft, the highest an Iowan has ever been chosen. He says he thinks he’ll start in class A balland begin working his way throught the minor league system and hope to get to the big leagues as quickly as possible. Clement is the leading hitter for U-S-C and ranks third on the school’s all-time home run list. He knows it will take time to make the adjustment from college to pro baseball. U-S-C’s director of baseball operations played in the pros and Clement says he’s help him know what he has to do to get ready. The Trojans visit Oregon State this weekend for an NCAA super regional and are looking to qualify for the College World Series in Omaha. He says it’s been a great season after some disappointing seasons. Clement says they’ve won 40 games and everthing seems to be falling in place. As a high school standout in Marshalltown Clement set the all-time career high school home run record with 75.