Seahawks’ Wilson: Joining the Yankees is not a stunt
“If you really know me, baseball is a part of my blood.” Russell Wilson Seahawks quarterback who is at Yankees camp
TAMPA – Rare is the day Giancarlo Stanton and Aaron Judge find a fellow human who can look them in the eyes, and to be certain, Russell Wilson does not meet that criteria.
Standing 6-6 and 6-7, respectively, sculpted like gods and blessed with the ability to pound baseballs over walls and out of stadiums, Stanton and Judge are just a month away from testing the limits of baseball superstardom in the Bronx.
So when Wilson, the Seattle Seahawks’ Super Bowl-winning quarterback, showed up Monday for a six-day
residency at New York Yankees camp, it was not his physical stature that made him relatable. Instead, it was a dose of star power that certainly broke up the monotony spring training can produce while also providing the Yankees a dose of megawatt star power that might let them know what they’re in for this year.
A month from now, Stanton, Judge and the Yankees will embark on the club’s most anticipated season in a decade, featuring a reigning NL MVP in Stanton and the 52-homer AL Rookie of the Year in Judge. This week, they’ll engage a four-time Pro Bowl quarterback who might have an idea or two about how to negotiate outsized stardom.
“You’re talking about the NFL,” rookie Yankees manager Aaron Boone says. “You’re talking about a quarterback. They’re the biggest stars, if you will, in our society, it seems like.
“The kind of character guy he is, to be around our young players is pretty exciting.”
Monday’s exercise was more about fantasies turned into reality.
Wilson, who stands 5-11 but appears perhaps even shorter than that, fulfilled what he called a life-long desire to be a Yankee. The Yankees soaked up the star in their midst, with veteran pitcher CC Sabathia sheepishly admitting that yes, he once rode Wilson to the brink of a fantasy football championship.
And Judge, like Stanton a high school receiver who turned down Division I football scholarship offers, professed his hope that he runs a few post patterns for the 2013 Super Bowl champion.
“I said, ‘Hey man, did you bring a football?’ ” Judge said he asked Wilson. “He says he’ll have one by the end of the week, so you might catch us out on a back field running some routes.”
Wilson, a fourth-round pick of the Colorado Rockies who played two minor league seasons before committing fully to football in college, did not shy away from his assignment: a batting practice group that included Stanton (59 home runs last season), Judge and Gary Sanchez.
After a few perfunctory swings in the first round, Wilson launched three balls over the Steinbrenner Field walls, including a closing shot that rocketed down the left-field line. He hit a halfdozen home runs.
Certainly, Wilson won’t quit his day job. But his swing and his quick hands at second base did allow one to wonder what he might have — or could — accomplish if he focused on baseball.
“He has a chance for anything,” Judge says. “The way you see him moving there, taking round balls, swinging in BP. You can’t be a quarterback of a Super Bowl team without being an athlete.
“If he did it for a couple years, he’d have a shot.”
Wilson batted .229 with five home runs and 19 stolen bases in two partial Class A seasons with the Colorado Rockies, playing part time as his football career took him from North Carolina State to Wisconsin and eventually a third-round spot with the Seahawks.
The Seahawks made sure he put the spikes away for good. His most recent contract guaranteed him $61 million. But Wilson made a spring training appearance with the Texas Rangers in consecutive springs and, after a twoyear respite, was “traded” from the Yankees to the Rangers this month.
And now he’s here, eager to rub elbows with Stanton and Judge and forge a symbiotic relationship that athletes often seek with their pro brethren.
“Some people for me get confused: ‘Is this just a stunt?’ They don’t know me,” he said with a slight laugh. “If you really know me, baseball is a part of my blood.”
Wilson, 29, said he was determined to play for the Yankees in honor of his father, Harrison Wilson III, who was 55 when he died in 2010 after complications from diabetes.
Harrison Wilson probably would have loved Judge, who Wilson said could play tight end in the NFL.
“I can move to tight end,” Judge mused. “I’m a little bigger now. If he’s throwing me dimes, he’ll make me look good.”