Imagine a world in which pigs flew to Mars, parallel lines intersected, and the Houston Astros played fairly.
Imagine a world in which a team from Detroit drafted ... a Super Bowl quarterback.
Now, are you sitting down?
Good.
Because that last fever dream really happened.
In 2014, the Detroit Tigers selected Patrick Mahomes in the 37th round of the MLB draft.
Yes, the Tigers, who as of Sunday will have drafted more quarterbacks to start in the Super Bowl than the Lions and Browns combined.
As you may be aware, Mahomes is now the wonder-armed star of the Kansas City Chiefs and the headliner in their big game against the San Francisco 49ers.
But that’s only who the reigning NFL MVP is in this universe.
What about the alternate one?
What if the son of a major leaguer and former prep baseball star instead became a Toledo Mud Hen?
“To me, that is the great question,” Tim Grieve said.
Grieve is the Texas-based scout for Tigers who nudged the franchise to draft Mahomes, and he graciously took us back this week to the lead-up of the 2014 draft.
At the time, it wasn’t certain which path Mahomes would travel.
Out of high school in Whitehouse, Texas, he was a good football prospect, but hardly a can’t-miss one. ESPN did not list Mahomes among the top 300 prospects in the 2014 class, while 247Sports had him as the 30th-best quarterback. He signed with Texas Tech over Houston and Rice, the only other schools that offered a scholarship.
Meanwhile, it was easy to imagine Mahomes following in the spiked footsteps of his dad, Pat, who pitched in the major leagues for 12 seasons. He had a mid-90s fastball and a prodigious bat. One game his senior year, the 6-3 right-hander struck out 16 batters in a no-hitter, outperforming rival ace and future first-round pick Michael Kopech before a crowd of three dozen scouts. At the plate, he tagged Kopech for three hits, including a double and a home run.
Grieve said Mahomes likely could have made the big leagues as a pitcher or a corner outfielder.
“The overwhelming thing with that kid as a baseball player was just the athleticism,” he told The Blade. “He wasn't really a naturally refined baseball player compared to some of these other kids we were scouting. Because he was such a good athlete, he was one of the few kids down here that played multiple other sports. Basketball, too. But he was a great-looking kid with the charisma and personality that you see now.
“You said, ‘All right, here’s an athlete, he’s got great bloodlines, it looks like he’s got the makeup. This is a guy I’d like to roll the dice on if I get a chance.’”
And a dice roll it would be.
As the draft approached, Mahomes let the scouts know he had his heart set on playing football. While a massive signing bonus perhaps would have changed his mind, no team wanted to run the risk of burning a high draft selection.
That included the Tigers, who instead waited until they had nothing to lose.
By the end of the 40-round draft, teams often use their picks to draft the relatives of their players or coaches, or to get their foot in the door with a promising college-bound prospect.
“At that point, we're not really trying to sign any of these kids,” said Grieve, who is now a Midwest cross-checker for the Tigers. “We don't really have room left. But we're going to keep taking picks. We're not going to start passing in the 37th round. So it becomes, ‘OK, who do we have left on the board that has value to us?’
“Patrick wanted to play football. We're not giving him $5 million to try to talk him out of it. But here’s a kid who we really liked. So let’s say he goes to Texas Tech and football doesn’t work out or he goes to Texas Tech and realizes baseball is his sport. Let’s be that team that started that relationship and got our foot in the door.”
After the Tigers made Mahomes the 1120th pick of the draft, Grieve called the prospect.
“It was for me to say, ‘Hey Patrick, look, I know what the answer is, I know what you want to do, but this is something you earned.’ He was gracious and humble. He said, ‘I appreciate you thinking this highly of me, and, certainly in a different circumstance, I'd love to tell you I’m happy to be a member of the Detroit Tigers.’”
The Tigers would have loved it, too.
But as it happened, his baseball days were numbered. Mahomes appeared in three games for the Red Raiders baseball team as a freshman — twice as a pinch hitter, once out of the bullpen — before turning his attention entirely to football.
You could argue he made the right choice.
Grieve laughed.
“I don't know what it says about me as a scout, that when people ask, ‘Hey, who's the best guy you ever drafted? I say, well, he's playing another sport,’” he said. “But it’s been a lot of fun. ... The overriding thing is what a great kid he was and still is. When I hung up that phone with him, I knew I was going to root for this kid.”
Including on Super Bowl Sunday.
First Published February 2, 2020, 12:39 a.m.
