He was ranked as the 17th best player in the 2007 Major League amateur draft, and most every scouting magazine and website listed him as a sure first-round pick. He had prepped at the exclusive Roxbury Latin High School in Newton, Mass., indicating he was as intelligent as he was athletic.And he's a very good looking guy to boot. He looks like a star pitcher.
In his senior year, he struck out 80 in just 40 innings and crafted a misprint-like 0.88 ERA.
He was named the Massachusetts Gatorade player of the year.
He spent his off-seasons playing in all-star leagues in Georgia and Arkansas and Florida and wowed the major league scouts with pinpoint control and three "plus" pitches, very unusual for a 17-year-old high school pitcher.
He had a fastball that topped out at 91 mph and a solid change as well. But it was his curveball that made scouts drool.
Knees buckled all across the state of Massachusetts when he took the mound.
During an All-Star game in Georgia, a major league scout was asked by a Sports Illustrated reporter if the kid reminded him of any major league pitchers he had seen play.
The scout leaned up against the batting cage and began to tap his chin with his finger, trying to think of an answer.
He finally nodded his head and said, sure, "Andy Pettitte, Mark Buehrle, and Tom Glavine."
That's very good company.
Another scout said this about the young pitcher: "This kid is very poised, polished and advanced for his age. Many young prospects have good arms but are still just young kids.
"He is a young man who shows command of not only pitches but of himself. He is an excellent representation of his family, his school, his team and his community. He will be a success in more than just baseball. He is a true leader. It will be fun to follow his progress in either college or pro ball."
And with that, Jack McGeary was selected in the 6th round of the 2007 Major League draft.
The 190th player taken.
How could that happen?
Because Jack McGeary was too smart and too good and too honest.
Throughout his senior year, the 6'3", 200 pound lefty warned every major league team that he was almost certain that he would be attending Stanford that fall.
"I want to go to Stanford, that's my first choice," said McGeary. "I'm willing to sign a major league contract, but the team is going to have to make it worth my while."
Unlike many high school players with tiny GPA's and big egos who might have a hard time getting into junior college, McGeary was an Ivy League candidate.
It wasn't a bargaining chip. He wanted to go to Stanford.
Well, it was a bargaining chip, but one that teams had to take seriously.
Round after round, all 30 teams passed up Jack McGeary. After the fifth round, Nationals' general manager Jim Bowden, who knew he had already amassed quite a haul in the draft, decided to take a chance and drafted the Massachusetts native with his 6th round pick.
The prospect of losing that sixth-round pick didn't worry Bowden very much. The chance of finding a player that would help the Nationals that low in the draft was minimal.
From 1995 through 2004, just 60 of the 300 players selected in the sixth round made it to the Major Leagues, and just five (Tim Hudson, Bill Hall, J.J. Putz, Shane Victorino and Scott Olsen) have had any real impact at the major league level.
Bowden didn't think there was much hope in signing McGeary. He had tried the same approach with pitcher Sean Black in the previous year's draft and came away empty-handed.
"Look, he's probably going to Stanford," Bowden told Nationals.com reporter Bill Ladson on the day of the draft. "We know that. But you never know in this game. We didn't do this except for one pick in this draft. Strategically, we thought it was the right thing to do. We drafted him just in case."
When Bowden contacted the family, they indicated two things. First, McGeary would be willing to sign with the Nationals. Second, it would have to be first-round money for it to happen.
That's not how things work in Major League Baseball.
Each round has a predetermined bonus amount that teams are bullied into staying within. To be sure, some teams don't, but most teams do.
The Lerner family was still feeling their way as the new owners of the Washington Nationals, and likely didn't want to risk angering Commissioner Bud Selig so early in their tenure.
And the McGeary family knew it.
"We were all set for him to go to Stanford," Rita McGeary said by phone. "We weren't even thinking about the Nationals. We just thought, 'They're not going to pay him. It wasn't so much what Jack was worth. It's really what Stanford was worth."
And said McGeary, "The Nationals still took me and still believe that hopefully, we can work something out. If we can, that would be great and I welcome the opportunity to do that. If not, I'll end up in Stanford. Obviously. I was surprised that I was taken as high as sixth. I thought I would be falling in the teens or 20s."
And so for the remainder of the summer, nothing happened.
Nothing.
Until 48 hours before the Aug. 15 signing deadline, that is. Bowden called the family and told them he had a plan. They arrived from Newton the next day and met with the Nationals' general manager in a steak house in the city.
While Bowden was laying out his proposal to the McGeary family, team president Stan Kasten flew to the owners meeting in Toronto to get the Lerners' approval.
It was ingenious.
The Nationals would sign McGeary and give him $1.8 million, close enough to first round money to make the family happy but well above the $123,000 recommended by Major League Baseball for the sixth round. The Nationals would also pay for his expenses at Stanford and would agree to allow him to pitch only when his schooling would allow.
That meant he would only be available from June through the end of the season. He would lose four months each year.
The McGearys were impressed and agreed. The Lerners were impressed and they also agreed.
And with 15 minutes to spare, Jack McGeary became a Washington National.
He pitched only two innings in 2007 for the Vermont Lake Monsters of the New York-Penn League before beginning his academic career at Stanford.
He pitched most of 2008 for the Gulf Coast Nationals, a "low-A" league that more resembles a baseball academy than a professional league. He started off slowly, and by mid-season, it was beginning to look like the experiment wasn't going to work.
Then all of a sudden, McGeary figured it out.
He ended the year with a record of 2-2, 4.07, but those numbers don't tell the real story. He led the league in games started. He led the league in strikeouts. He struck out nearly 10 per 9 innings while walking just two, amazing numbers for that level of play.
He consistently painted the black with his fastball and buckled the batters knees time and time again with his major-league-ready curve.
He looked promising. Very promising.
And he did this without the benefit of any Spring Training in 2008.
And then he went back to Stanford for his sophomore season.
Baseball America ranked McGeary as the Nationals' fifth-best prospect heading into 2009, but he would no doubt have been much higher had he pitched a full season in 2007 and 2008.
But how long could Jack McGeary be both a full-time college student and a full-time baseball player and still keep his wits about him?
Turns out, about two years.
Nationals' GM Jim Bowden announced on Saturday that Jack McGeary's agent told the team that he was forgoing the remainder of his college career (at least for now) and will concentrate on baseball full-time.
Boo-yah!
This will most certainly accelerate his progression through the Nationals' farm system. When asked how long it would take to reach the major leagues when he originally signed with the Nationals, McGeary replied that he thought it would take five years.
He might be able to shave a year off of that prediction now, maybe more.
The kid has the same arrows in his quiver that Tom Glavine did when he was a Massachusetts high schooler 20 years earlier.
Only McGeary's curve is a little better.
That doesn't mean he'll be the next Tom Glavine. It just means he has the chance to be a very good major league pitcher in the mold of Tom Glavine.
And he would never have been a Washington National if Jim Bowden had not been the general manager of the Washington Nationals.
I wrote an article a few days ago blaming Omar Minaya for the current state of the team. Many readers left comments questioning this premise.
Some called Bowden as the worst general manager in the major leagues today.
Hmmm.
Well, Brian Cashman, Theo Epstein, Andy McPhail, Andrew Friedman, J.P. Riccardi, Frank Wren, Mike Hill, Ruben Amaro Jr., Kenny Williams, Mark Shapiro, Dave Dombrowski, Dayton Moore, Bill Smith, Jim Hendry, Walt Jockety, Ed Wade, Doug Melvin, Neal Huntington, John Mozeliak, Tony Reigans, Billy Beane, Jack Zduriencik, Jon Daniels, Josh Byrnes, Dan O'Dowd, Ned Colletti, Kevin Towers and Brian Sabean (or their predecessors) had the opportunity to take Jack McGeary in a later round and become a hero to their fans. They didn't.
Jim Bowden did.
Jim Bowden stole a first-round pick in 2007, taking a very mature, very intelligent, very promising pitcher that the team really had no hope of drafting, little alone signing.
Jim Bowden didn't sign Aaron Crow, a very immature pitcher who in an interview this past summer with Kansas City Star reporter Bill Reiter said that he was spending his days sleeping in and drinking beer. He worked out in between.
Contrast that with Jack McGeary who studied when he wasn't working out and worked out when he wasn't studying.
Jack McGeary accepted $1.8 million to sign with the Nationals, calling it first-round money. Aaron Crow turned down twice that amount, calling it an affront to his ability.
So why are so many Nationals' fans pummeling Jim Bowden for not signing Aaron Crow but nary a word comes from their lips about one of the real steals in the amateur draft in the last decade?
I'm sure someone will try to explain it to me.
Again.
Until then, however, the Nationals' future just got a little brighter.
And we can thank Jim Bowden, "the worst general manager in baseball," for it
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