If you love baseball, you’re going to love watching Dexter Fowler, the Rockies’ outfield prospect called up from Double-A Tulsa on Tuesday.
I remember the first time I saw Fowler in spring training in Tucson. With long, graceful strides, he ran down a ball deep in the right-center gap at Hi Corbett Field, making a difficult, over-the-shoulder catch look easy, dare I say artistic.
I remember him jogging back to the dugout, his 100-watt smile advertising his love of the game.
Remember the buzz Troy Tulo- witzki sparked when he came up? It wasn’t just that Tulo gobbled up grounders and threw lasers across the infield. It was the way Tulo did things with unconscious power and flair.
Fowler plays the outfield with that same kind of pizzazz. He’s not a hot dog, just a beautiful athlete to watch.
A 6-foot-5, 175-pound switch hitter with speed, power and a “plus” arm, Fowler has the potential to be what old-timers call a “five-tool player.”
I remember talking to Rockies general manager Dan O’Dowd about Fowler back in March. O’Dowd, not one to gush praise, looked at me and said, “He’s a special player. More than that, he’s a special person. Just wait ’til you get to know him.”
At Tulsa this season, Fowler hit .335 with 31 doubles, nine triples, nine home runs and 64 RBIs in 108 games. He also stole 20 bases.
But raw numbers don’t begin to tell his story.
Fowler came out of Milton High School in Alpharetta, Ga., in June 2004. He could have gone to Harvard and played basketball. He could have played baseball at the University of Miami. Instead, he signed with the Rockies, who gambled by taking him in the 14th round of the draft, the 410th player overall.
Fowler was just days away from heading to Miami when the Rockies corralled him with a $925,000 signing bonus.
Now he’s in the big leagues. There’s a good chance he’ll be the Rockies’ starting center fielder next season.
How much playing time Fowler gets this month depends on whether the Rockies make a real run at the National League West flag. There’s no telling if Fowler will thrive or shrink when he takes the big-league stage for the first time.
But if you’re a baseball fan, do yourself a favor and come watch him play.
