David Price once almost quit baseball in college to go work at a McDonalds. Seriously...You can't make this shit up. That is just part of the story in the upcoming issue of Sports Illustrated about Price and being a black baseball player in this day and age.

IN JANUARY 2005, during his freshman year at Vanderbilt, David Price decided to drop out of school, quit baseball and work at McDonald's. He picked his preferred location, near his home in Murfreesboro, Tenn. He told his father, Bonnie, about his plan. Then he informed Vandy coach Tim Corbin of his intention in a tearful meeting in the Commodores' locker room. Sure, Price was a 6'6" lefthanded pitcher who could throw upward of 90 miles per hour and seven months earlier had been drafted in the 19th round by the Los Angeles Dodgers. But he had also just been shelled in a preseason intrasquad game, clearly a call to the Golden Arches. "It was definitely kind of out there," Corbin recalls, "but I couldn't laugh because he was so serious."

The issue about so few African-Americans in baseball always seems very foreign to us. For one, the Rays are one of the top teams when it comes to African-Americans on the roster. And for us personally, we were a childhood friend of Bruce Thompson, whom some of you may be familiar. Bruce was the most talented high school player we ever saw. He was the Carl Crawford of Florida high school baseball.

Damn it! We really got our hopes up about Jason Bay...Arrgggggg.

Young, Gifted And Black [SI.com]