Russell Wilson spurned baseball in favor of a football career that’s working out pretty well, but that hasn’t stopped the MLB team that drafted him from admiring the Super Bowl quarterback.
After Wilson’s teary-eyed interview after the NFC Championship game, Rockies general manager Danny Montgomery saw what made him fall in love with Wilson when he drafted him in 2010.
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“[Wilson] is giving me chills," Montgomery told MLB.com. "A true angel. Holy cow."
The Rockies took Wilson in the fourth round out of North Carolina State, even though he really didn’t have a true position or extensive experience. But it wasn’t just his play that enticed Colorado to spend a top pick on him.
"I would get there during batting practice and the kid was at the top step, watching the visiting club's best players as if he was a main player trying to pick up something," Montgomery said about Wilson’s playing days at N.C. State. "And he didn't play much. But you saw how he went about his business, how he did extra work, how he coached to his coaches. You could see why his sports IQ was so high.
"Then I got to talking to (Minor League instructor Jay Matthews), and he always said, 'This guy's got something special about him.' "
Wilson only played 93 combined Minor League games in the Rockies’ farm system and batted .229, but that was plenty of time to leave an impression on the club.
"If he had stayed with us and gone through the system, I think he would have been an All-Star at second base, no doubt," Montgomery said. "He had a special insight at a young age, and he would have been special at whatever he wanted to do."
Wilson was drafted again by the Rangers in the Triple-A phase of the 2013 Rule 5 Draft. He took ground balls and batting practice at spring training for a day. However, his Texas and Seattle affiliations mean little to those who bonded with him during his first pro baseball stint.
"He's a Rockie," Matthews said.