re: Jake Locker Retires

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into play] & a stud running game to be successful. His toughness is unquestionable.

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Now that I think about it more, I'm going to say that he's not going to try baseball. He's probably going to move back to his small hometown where he's a legend, spend a lot of time with his family, hang out with friends, hunt and fish, and live on a ranch. He'll probably help coach his old high school team too. I know him and Michael Koenen opened up a gym in that town recently, so he'll probably spend a lot of time involved with that too.

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“We’re not interested in him as a baseball player,” Dipoto said. “We’re going to focus on the guys we have. We have enough going on.”

Locker was a star pitcher, outfielder, quarterback and defensive back at Farndale High School in Washington. The Angels originally drafted him in the 40th round in ’06, but Locker didn’t sign so he could play quarterback at the University of Washington. They drafted him again three years later, even though Locker hadn’t played baseball regularly since high school.

Locker considered baseball merely as a fallback option, so remained in college for two more seasons, was drafted eighth overall by the Tennessee Titans in 2011, started only 12 games from 2013-14 and hung it up while in the early stages of free agency.

The Angels signed Locker under former GM Tony Reagins, while Dipoto was working in the D-backs’ front office.

“I knew his background only because he was a baseball prospect, football guy,” Dipoto said. “We weren’t really on him when I was in Arizona. Generally with the two-sport guys who we don’t think have interest in being a baseball player we don’t waste our time.”

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