Tim Tebow Nearly an Angel?

Don't take the title too literal folks. No, the man didn't have a near death experience and almost become an angel. It was something totally different. Back in the high school days he was nearly drafted by the Angels--Los Angeles Angles (or Anaheim back in his day I believe).

Photo from TerezOwens.com

Like many kids in high school, Tebow was a multi-sport athlete and played baseball in the spring. Apparently he was pretty good too. As a junior he had four home runs on the season and hit for impressive .494 batting average. His numbers and overall play was enough to get the attention of the Angels organization.

“He had a strong arm and had a lot of power. If he would have been there his senior year he definitely would have had a good chance to be drafted,” said one-time Angels Florida-based scout Stephen Hargetts. “He had leverage to his swing. He had some natural loft. He had some good power. He was a good athlete..."

Had he played his senior year in high school there is a strong chance that he would have been drafted, but instead he finished high school early so he could enroll in Florida in the spring and get a jump on his football career.

Tom Kotchman, who worked for the Angles then but is now a Florida area scout for the Boston Red Sox, said this in a recent interview with WEEI:

“We wanted to draft him, but he never sent back his information card. Either it never got to him, or … It’s Tim Tebow. Who knows if it got to him, and if it did we just never got it back. Otherwise were were going to take him.”

Without that card, which included questions pertaining to his interest in playing professional baseball the Angels never put him on their draft board.

Could he have been the next big thing in baseball? We'll never know. What we do know is that he would have gotten just what he needs in football while playing baseball--playing time. Tebow would have been down in the minors getting all the seasoning that he needed.

If only there was a minor league in the NFL...