DETROIT (AP) Alex Avila was the best player available on the Detroit Tigers’ board when it was their turn to select a player in the fifth round of the 2008 amateur draft.
His dad suggested the Tigers pick someone else.
”I didn’t want people to think it was a favor,” Tigers general manager Al Avila recalled. ”I thought he would have a better opportunity if someone else drafted him so he wouldn’t have to deal with the scrutiny of being my son.”
David Chadd, who is now the team’s assistant general manager and was its scouting director back then under general manager Dave Dombrowski, told Avila it would mark the first time the organization passed on the top player on the board that early in a draft.