By Kevin Allenspach

Playing minor league baseball can sometimes feel like toiling in obscurity. Places like Everett, Washington, and Wilmington, Delaware, and many others in between are a long way from the bright lights of the big leagues – figuratively and literally. But for the past 25 years, Major League Baseball has augmented its annual midseason festivities with the All-Star Futures Game, a chance to glimpse the stars of tomorrow on the same stage as the MLB all-star game.

Already, 16 of the 47 players who participated in last year’s Futures Game have graduated to the majors. While few are yet widely known, and it’s no guarantee of stardom, consider the participants from 10 years ago: 48 of the 50 players in 2015 have made it to The Show. You’ve probably heard of Aaron Judge
(six-time all-star, two-time AL MVP), Blake Snell (two-time Cy Young award winner), Trea Turner (three- time all-star, 2021 NL batting champ), Kyle Schwarber (2022 NL home run leader) and Matt Olson (NL home run and RBI leader in 2023), not to mention three-time all-stars Ozzie Albies, Rafael Devers and
Ketel Marte and others among the world’s best players.

You don’t get invited to the Futures Game if scouts don’t think your middle name might as well be “Stud.” That’s the company two former St. Cloud Rox players could find themselves in for the 26th iteration on Saturday, July 12, at Truist Park in Atlanta. Brice Matthews, who played for the Rox in 2021- 22, and Charlie Condon, who became the highest-drafted player in Northwoods League history at No. 3 overall in 2024 – two years after playing in St. Cloud, both are among those scheduled to be in the spotlight when the seven-inning game begins at 3 p.m. (Central time; televised on MLB Network and simulcast on MLB.tv, MLB.com and the MLB app.)

“Both of them are special players and you could tell when they were here there were elements of their game that stood out,” said Scott Schreiner, Rox co-owner/managing partner and general manager, who has been with the team for 14 years and previously was GM of the St. Cloud River Bats, as the franchise
was known from 1997-2011. “They’re both high-character guys, too. They’ve acknowledged our role in their development and we couldn’t be more proud.”

Matthews and Condon have doubled the number of former Rox given a chance to play in the game. Michael Busch, who spent the summer of 2017 in St. Cloud, appeared in 2021 and has played more than 230 games the past two seasons as a first baseman for the Chicago Cubs. Will Craig, who played for the
Rox in 2014, also played in the Futures Game in 2019 as a springboard to joining the Pittsburgh Pirates a year later.

It would seem the future for Matthews, a middle infielder, and Condon, who can play first, third and the outfield, is at least as bright.

Matthews, who appeared in 84 games for the Rox – hitting .288 with eight homers, 49 RBI while playing a key role on the first team in Northwoods history to post back-to-back 50-win seasons, is the top-rated prospect in the Houston Astros’ system. After hitting .266 in his first two seasons at Nebraska, he was a different player following his Rox experience, recording the second 20-homer-20-stolen-base season in Big Ten history as a junior. That led to him being drafted 28th overall in 2023, and he’s now a 23-year-old second baseman/shortstop with the Class AAA Sugar Land (Texas) Space Cowboys, for whom he hit .283 through his first 72 games, including 10 homers, 39 RBI and 24 stolen bases. Reports Thursday, July 10, suggested the Astros are calling him up, which could preclude his appearance Saturday in Atlanta, and it’s possible he could be Houston’s starting second baseman in 2026.

“His bat speed and ability to steal bases were things that made you go, ‘Whoa,’ when he was here,” said Bats manager Nick Studdard, who served as St. Cloud’s hitting coach during the seasons in which both Matthews and Condon played here. “Brice was a little more cleaned up than Charlie was when we got him. (Matthews) is just so athletic. He was an all-state quarterback out of high school in Texas and he’s from the Houston area and played in the Astros’ youth academy. So he could be on the verge of a dream with his hometown team.”

Condon made an even greater transformation. He came to St. Cloud as a gangly 6-foot-6 redshirt freshman from Georgia, lightly recruited out of high school and with no college at-bats. He homered in his first game of the 2022 season and burst on the scene for scouts when he went 3-for-3 with two homers and won MVP in the Northwoods all-star game at Wisconsin Rapids. Then in 2023, he rocketed to an SEC-record 25 homers and in 2024 set the national standard in the BBCOR era (since a 2011 effort to reduce the trampoline effect of aluminum bats) with 37. Leading Division I hitters in average (.433) and OPS (1.565) also led to the Golden Spikes Award as the best player in college baseball. A hand injury overshadowed his 25-game pro debut last year, in which he hit .180. Then he suffered a fractured wrist in spring training, giving him a late jump on his first full season. But he was recently promoted to the Class AA Hartford Yard Goats after hitting .312 with three homers and 17 RBI in 35 games at Class A Spokane and is ranked No. 23 on MLB Pipeline’s Top 100 Prospects list. At just 22, he already knows how to overcome any doubts.

“Charlie’s story is so special because I don’t think anyone knew when he was here that he would become what he is,” Studdard said. “You knew he could be good. He had that presence in the box, but he still had a lot of baby things about him at that point. He was a great kid and the guys loved being around him. But you’d be as apt to find him playing video games on his phone as anything else. He needed to learn how important it was to eat right and get good sleep and get to the gym and treat
baseball like a job. Playing here, you could see him develop confidence as he learned the lifestyle, playing every day. Before long, he realized ‘I can do this.’ It’s not the reason he’s the player he is today, but he wouldn’t be the player he’s become without it.”

Both Schreiner and Studdard remain in touch with Matthews and Condon, the latter of whom also can be followed on X, the former Twitter, @CharlieCondon14. They’ll also be watching the results of the 2025 MLB draft, which begins Sunday, also in Atlanta.

In addition to Craig and Busch, who were first-round picks of the Pirates in 2016 and Los Angeles Dodgers in 2019, respectively, two other players in St. Cloud’s Northwoods League history have been selected in the first round: Thomas Diamond (2002-03/2004 Texas Rangers) and Tim Wheeler
(2007/2009 Rockies). Diamond is one of 25 former River Bats who played in the majors, a list that includes Robb Quinlan (1998), Justin Huisman (1998-99), Chris Demaria (2000-01), Tom Gorzelanny (2001), Chris Basak (1998-99), Sean Kazmar (2003), Casey McGehee (2001), Chris Jakubauskas (1999), Jason Jaramillo (2002), Robbie Weinhardt (2007), Konrad Schmidt (2003, 2005), Steve Edlefsen (2004), John Gaub (2004), Dan Straily (2009), Roger Kieschnick (2006), Mark Canha (2008), Austin Barnes (2010), Matt Reynolds (2010), Buddy Baumann (2007), Tony Renda (2009), Jake Smith (2011), Jason Wheeler (2010), Mitch Garver (2010-11) and Josh Smith (2010).

The Rox have placed 18 players in the majors so far, with the most recent being Alex Carrillo, a right- handed pitcher with the New York Mets. He played in St. Cloud in 2019 and became the 400th Northwoods Leaguer to graduate to MLB when he debuted on Tuesday, July 8. The other Rox who have gone on to the majors include: Ben Meyer (2012), Alex McRae (2013), Josh Taylor (2014), Zach Pop (2015), Jay Flaa (2013), Lucas Gilbreath (2015), TJ Friedl (2016), Jared Solomon (2017), Ben DeLuzio
(2016), Cam Eden (2017), Daniel Schneemann (2017), Will Warren (2018), Drew Avans (2017), Jack Winkler (2020-21) and Otto Kemp (2021).

St. Cloud’s overall total of 43 major leaguers leads the Northwoods League. The La Crosse Loggers are second with 32.

“That goes a long way when it comes to recruiting players to come here,” Schreiner said. “La Crosse has had some big names – Max Scherzer and Chris Sale are two who’ve had amazing careers. But no one can match us for the overall quality of players we’re putting into pro baseball. And maybe Brice Matthews and Charlie Condon will ultimately be big names for us.”

Kevin Allenspach is a former sportswriter who covered the Northwoods League during his 22-year career at the St. Cloud Times. In addition to being the Rox scoreboard/pitch clock operator, he is now a freelance writer and author. Find more at www.kevinallenspach.com.