ST. LOUISDuring the early stages of the baseball season, it isn't uncommon for clubhouses around MLB to screen NBA games. Of course, it's not exactly breaking news: Baseball players are sports fans too.For the Cincinnati Reds, it provides unique fodder. Each member of the organization is aware that rookie starting pitcher Amir Garrett once excelled as a two-sport athlete.He played basketball at famed Findlay Prep near Las Vegas, which has had eight alumni drafted and 10 play in the NBA overall since 2010. The list includes Avery Bradley, Tristan Thompson, Kelly Oubre Jr., and 2013's No. 1 pick Anthony Bennett. There are more to come in current college stars Dillon Brooks (Oregon), Allonzo Trier (Arizona), and Nigel Williams-Goss (Gonzaga).Garrett, 24, went on to playcollegiately at St. John's. But he is best known for a collection of dunks that feature the kind of acrobatics that would drop an Olympic gymnast's jaw to the floor.During those NBA watch parties, Garrett's major league teammates pepper him with questions as if someone had slipped them a press pass. Awestruck by a move, a Reds player might ask if Garrett can do the same. "Yeah, I can do that," he'll respond. How about a windmill' "Sure." How about under the legs' "That's simple," he says in an interview with Bleacher Report.In fact, even as Garrett recounts his mental highlight reel, Cincinnati infielder Scooter Gennett stops his walk to the field just to listen in, grinning ear to ear. Among Garrett's best was during high school when he caught the ball off the side of the backboard, did a 360 and slammed it home.Typing Garrett's name into YouTube would answer his teammates' questions. A simple Google search, however, will reveal why he gave it all up: The left-handed hurler is the top-ranked pitching prospect (and No. 2 overall) in the Reds' organization and 64th overall,according to MLB.com. Garrett is 30 pounds heavier now, but he says he wouldn't need long to catch up to the likes of the NBA's best dunkers. Among his favorites are Vince Carter, Aaron Gordon, Blake Griffin and Russell Westbrook who, according to Garrett, "dunks the ball like he's mad at the rim.""Give me a month or something back in the gym, I could probably get back to that," Garrett said.For now Garrett is content to simply watch basketball. He'll occasionally shoot. When he returns to the Las Vegas area, he's always invited to play pickup at Findlay Prep but declines. His focus is solely on baseball.Garrett made his MLB debut Friday, throwing six shutout innings in a game against the St. Louis Cardinals. The day ended quite differently than it had started. Restlessness caused a virtually sleepless night Thursday. Garrett woke up at 7, feeling more like throwing up than pitching."All day I was just anxious," Garrett said. "To take my mind off it, I went shopping. When I got on the field, I was just fine, man. It was just like another game."This isn't some triumphant storyone in which Garrett spurned a promising professional basketball career so that he could chase his true love, baseball. Fact is Garrett was torn between the two sports.He was selected by Cincinnati in the 22nd round of the 2011 draft, likely falling because of the uncertainty as to which sport he would choose to pursue. But Garrett understood his value to the organization and knew that fewer people can throw a baseball 96 miles per hour than can dunk a basketball. His skill-set on the diamond allowed him to stand out more in the professional ranks than that which he offered in basketball. So pursuing a baseball career was the more logical choice."The Reds weren't pushing me to go play baseball right away.It was tough for me because I didn't know what I wanted to do," Garrett said."I'm glad I did that. If I could do it all over again, I would do the same thing. It was a time in my life I couldn't pass upcollege basketball. College, I enjoyed it."He was as much a prodigy on the baseball diamond as the basketball court. Even as a youngster, Garrett was a household name in the Las Vegas area. Kris Bryant's dad tried to convince him to play for his travel team. Yes, the same Kris Bryant who won a World Series with the Chicago Cubs and earned the 2016 NL MVP award.The duo is part of a cadre of young MLB players from the Vegas metro area. Garrett played alongside Washington Nationals outfielder Bryce Harper when the two were younger. He vividly remembers playing in a tournament in Omaha, Nebraska, with Harper. He played against Bryant and Texas Rangers third baseman Joey Gallo, considered one of the best power-hitting prospects in baseball, though the details of his performance against them are a little hazy.Playing with each of those major leaguers has instilled a deeply emotional connection to the area of his youth. Garrett promises more great athletes will come out of the desert, which he feels is vastly underrated as an athletic hotbed."People overlook Las Vegas," Garrett said. "I think you would have to say it's kind of personal. You want to put on for your city."That someone like Garrett may come out of the area again is unlikely. Very few, if any, prep athletes are top-100 recruits in basketball and can throw a fastball in the mid-90s. Though basketball is now far behind Garrett, remnants still appear on the baseball field.Reds starting pitcher Brandon Finnegan says there have been times when Garrett has leaped to catch a chopper over the pitching mound. Finnegan met Garrett in spring training but calls him one his closest friends on the team."They like to say pitchers aren't athletes, but I like to think pitchers are the most athletic on the field," Finnegan said."It has to do with just being able to do more than just pitchfielding, running, backing up your position, being an all-around athlete on the mound."But make no mistake, it helps with the craft of pitching as well."Athleticism is going to help you as a pitcher repeat your delivery," Cincinnati reliever Michael Lorenzen said.Garrett is, unquestionably, the best athlete on the Reds, if not the best athlete in baseball altogether. It's a fact he appears to take pride in, readily willing to discuss his basketball career with anyone who asks.The dunks over 7-footers and 360s are as much a part of his story as strikeout totals and ERA.But when he tells his basketball story, Garrett is as certain to talk about the highlights as he is the lowlights. He pointed out that there are YouTube clips of other players dunking over him, making it look as is if he couldn't jump at all.It's in that self-realization that it becomes clear why Garrett isn't on a basketball court, but on a baseball diamond. It's a place he can spend his days a little closer to his competitionprecisely 10 inches highfirmly glued to the pitching rubber. Seth Gruen is a national baseball columnist for Bleacher Report. Follow him onTwitter@SethGruen.
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