Next Tim Tebow? Florida Gators quarterback Feleipe Franks signed by Boston Red Sox

HOOVER, Ala. — Feleipe Franks was as surprised as anyone when the Boston Red Sox selected him the 31st round of the MLB Draft (947th overall) early last month.

The Florida Gators quarterback found out the week before that the organization had some interest in him, but it’s not like baseball is on his mind much these days. He hasn’t played since he was a junior at Wakulla High in Crawfordville, Florida, way back in 2015. Football has been his primary focus ever since and still is.

But now, Franks has a backup plan — on Friday, Boston announced that they had signed the Florida quarterback. He received a $40,000 signing bonus.

“They gave me a good opportunity with a great organization,” Franks said Monday at SEC Media Days.

Quarterback Feleipe Franks, a redshirt junior, is coming off a breakout 2018 campaign during which he completed 58.4 percent of his passes for 2,457 yards and 24 touchdowns. (Photo: Kim Klement, USA TODAY Sports)

“They do need a lot of help in the bullpen, it looks like. We’ve been struggling that way,” joked Gators head coach Dan Mullen, himself a Red Sox fan. “He can throw. He’s got a lot of heat. He said he threw at 95 in the workout for them. I’ve seen, though, he’s still working on his accuracy. I don’t know if I’d want to get in the batter’s box if he’s throwing 95.”

Told about his coach’s comments, Franks said Mullen “wouldn’t want to be in there because he would get struck out.”

Still, Franks didn’t predict his fastball would be in the mid-90s. He was the No. 41 right-handed pitcher in the country in the Class of 2016, according to Perfect Game, but he was topping out at 89 to 90 miles per hour in high school, and he said he didn’t practice much at all before throwing for the Red Sox.

“It came kind of natural,” he said. “If I had have worked on it, I think I could go faster. But I didn’t work on it too much.”

Per NCAA rules, Franks can sign with the Red Sox but as long as he doesn’t sign any endorsement deals nor play for Boston while a college athlete, he’s still eligible for the Gators.

Franks, understandably, is busy with football. The redshirt junior is coming off a breakout 2018 campaign during which he completed 58.4 percent of his passes for 2,457 yards and 24 touchdowns for a 10-win Gators team, and expectations are even higher going into Mullen’s second year as head coach. The quarterback’s goal is still to one day play in the NFL.

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But it never hurts to have options.

“I think it’s a great honor for him to have that opportunity,” Mullen said. “There’s another quarterback that I coached that I don’t know if anybody’s heard of him, he’s kind of a minor league ballplayer right now, played for the Triple-A Mets in Tim Tebow, and he’s managing to try to pick up baseball.

“So maybe when football is done, maybe he has a future in baseball. That’d be really exciting for him. I’d be really happy for him. I’m glad it was the Red Sox. I’m a big Red Sox fan. If one of our guys got to go to a team, I’d love for it to be the Red Sox.”

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