the Dick Howser Trophy as National Collegiate Baseball Player of the Year, following his junior baseball season in 1995. During his career at Tennessee (1993–1995), he recorded a .370 batting average, with 38 home runs and 238 RBI (both school records), while also pitching 193 innings, registering an ERA of 2.24, with 172 strikeouts and 23 saves. In 1995, he set the Tennessee saves record with 11, while posting a 0.89 ERA. Helton also has the NCAA Division I record for most consecutive scoreless innings, at 47. Helton spent the summer of 1994 playing for the Orleans Cardinals of the Cape Cod Baseball League and was named a league all-star. MLB career Draft and debut Helton was the eighth overall pick of the 1995 Major League Baseball draft, selected in the first round by the Colorado Rockies, and signed on August 1, 1995. He spent the next two years in the minor leagues, playing for the class-A Asheville Tourists, AA New Haven Ravens, and AAA Colorado Springs Sky Sox before moving up to the majors. Helton made his major-league debut in 1997 on August 2, a 6–5 road loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates. He started in left field, flied out in his first at-bat, singled in his next time up off Francisco Córdova, and hit a solo home run off Marc Wilkins. 1997–1999: Early career During the 1997 season, Helton hit .280/.337/.484 (batting average, on-base percentage, slugging percentage), with five home runs, in 35 games played. When Rockies first baseman Andrés Galarraga went to the Atlanta Braves in 1998, Helton became the full-time starter at first base for Colorado during the 1998 season. The Rockies named Helton their club representative in 1998, the first time the team ever gave a rookie that role. He hit .315/.380/.530, with 25 home runs and 97 RBI, in 152 games played. Helton led all major-league rookies in average (.315), home runs (25), RBI (97), multi-hit games (49), total bases (281), slugging percentage (.530) and extra base hits (63). He also led all National League rookies in runs (78), hits (167) and on-base percentage (.380). At the time, only Mike Piazza (35), David Justice (28) and Darryl Strawberry (26) had hit more home runs as an NL rookie since 1972, and only Piazza had more RBI (112). Helton finished second to Kerry Wood of the Chicago Cubs in the voting for National League Rookie of