It’s been 12 years since the San Diego Padres selected Matt Bush with the first overall pick in the 2004 Major League Baseball Draft. Finally, he’s about to fulfill his big league dream after a wild journey that saw the pitcher spend more than three years in prison.
The Texas Rangers are calling up Bush before Friday night’s game against the Toronto Blue Jays, according to multiple reports. Bush, now 30 years old, signed a minor league contract with the Rangers in December and began the season with Double-A Frisco.
Bush’s story is crazy, to say the least. Drafted as a shortstop, he ultimately converted to a pitcher while still with the Padres organization. But his baseball career quickly unraveled amid several run-ins with the law, the most recent of which involved a drunken driving incident in which he hit a 72-year-old motorcyclist.
Before this season, Bush hadn’t played baseball in five years. His last stop was Double-A Montgomery in the Tampa Bay Rays system — he joined Triple-A Durham at the end of the 2011 season but never appeared in a game for the Bulls — and that stint ended when the organization placed him on the restricted list following the March 2012 drunken driving incident.
It’s been a long road to The Show. But now, Bush is here, so long as he can keep it together.
Thumbnail photo via YouTube screen grab
