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The Sox put out a false report that Teixeira wanted to go to college, which kept teams from drafting him. The strategy worked in one sense, but it backfired badly when Teixeira's adviser Scott Boras and his father John were so upset with what the Sox had done that they walked away from a take-it-or-leave it $1.5 million bonus. Teixeira ended up going to Georgia Tech. "That was the greatest decision of my life, both professionally and personally," said Teixeira recently. "It was made very clear to me that I wasn't ready for pro baseball. The business of it is something I completely understand now, but as an 18-year-old kid it was completely unfair." "I got to go to college and have the three best years of my life. And I can't complain on how my career has turned out. I was upset about it for a couple of weeks, but then I started getting into college, and once I stepped on the campus of Georgia Tech, I knew it was meant to be." |
The Red Sox landed Mark Teixeira when they drafted him in the ninth round of the 1998 draft, but he chose to attend Georgia Tech when his family and he learned how Boston landed him.