• Joe is one of a handful of baseball greats from St. Paul, including Paul Molitor, Dave Winfield and Jack Morris.
• Joe was named All-State in three sports during his senior year at Cretin-Derham.
• Joe struck out just once in his high school career and finished with a .567 average.
• Joe was the first athlete named the nation’s top high school football and baseball player in the same season.
• Joe was a member of the USA national junior baseball team in 1998, 1999 and 2000. He was voted the best hitter in the world junior tournament in Panama in 2000.
• Joe was the First-Team catcher on the 2001 High School All-America squad. Other first-teamers included J.J. Hardy, David Wright and Scott Kazmir.
• In 2001, Joe was named High School Player of the Year by Gatorade, USA Today and Parade Magazine.
• Before Joe, the last high-school catcher drafted #1 was Danny Goodwin in 1971. The last catcher to be taken with the top pick was B.J. Surhoff in 1985.
• Joe was offered football scholarships by Miami, Arizona and Minnesota as well as FSU.
• Joe made All-Metro First Team in basketball during his senior year. He led his team to the semifinals of the 2001 state championships.
• Joe dated former Miss USA Chelsea Cooley in 2006.
• Joe’s proclivity for hitting to the opposite field in the minors prompted some teams to concoct a backwards shift.
• Joe’s “tutor” during his first spring training was veteran backstop Tom Prince.
• Joe played for the U.S. team in the 2003 Futures Game. He also played for Team USA in the Olympic qualifying tournament that year.

© Copyright 2006 Black Book Partners, LLC. All rights reserved.