Coro: Cotton kept eye on baseball

Parents' typical home rules for their children include no hitting, running or throwing in the house.

Quin Cotton was encouraged to hit a nerf ball with his plastic bat as a toddler.

He was encouraged to run when his mother laid out bases in her kitchen.

He threw into the house once when one of his baseball tosses off an outside wall misfired and broke a window.

Like sugary or shiny lures for other kids, baseball had Cotton fixated on the sport from not long after "ball" was his first word and right up to this week, when he leads Grand Canyon during the WAC Tournament at Hohokam Stadium in Mesa.

Cotton grew up taking in sports by osmosis and practice with his parents, Theresa Smith Cotton and Anthony Cotton, who were sportswriters covering everything from college and pro sports to the Olympics.

"Looking back now, I realize how encouraging they were of me playing sports and developing a solid love for the game at a very young age," Quin said. "I'm so grateful to them for that. Both my parents played sports and covered sports, so they had a love for the game and experience with just about any sport I played. They taught me right. They taught me to respect and love the game. They pretty much did everything they could to get me to where I am today."

Today, Cotton stands as a player Baseball America has tabbed as GCU's top prospect for the June draft after ranking 14th in the nation for batting average last season and hitting a team-best .351 in WAC play this season. He is draft eligible as a junior and graduated last month with a degree in finance and economics.

In the past two years, Cotton has been an All-Star in two summer leagues (Alaska in 2017 and the famed one in Cape Cod last year), won WAC Player of the Year last season and was named a preseason All-American by Perfect Game this year. None of it satisfies Cotton, who lamented a late summer slump at Cape Cod and had gaudy expectations to hit .400 this season even as teams started pitching around him more.

21321 — **Cotton playing baseball as a boy.**

That is the inner fire that always has pushed Cotton in baseball from the time he joined his mother coaching a youth softball team and took grounders with girls who were five years older than him. He seemed destined for the sport when he put on catcher's gear as a diapered 1-year-old at his aunt's house.

When his lacrosse coach gave him an ultimatum in sixth grade, Anthony was sure he would choose lacrosse but Quin picked baseball. When Quin needed to focus on one sport in high school before his junior year, he gave up basketball to spend a winter preparing for baseball in the weight room and hit into a net with batting boxes that he drew in the home garage.

"Once he started hitting balls out of the backyard when he was little, we had to go to the park all the time," Theresa said. "We'd go to center field and Quin would have me throw it just out of his reach. He'd say, 'Make it hard, make it hard.' If he could run it down, he'd say, 'Do it again.' "

He still says it, playing catch with his mother after this season's home finale which doubled as Mother's Day, tweeting the video to more than 800 likes.

As sportswriters, Theresa and Anthony were well aware of the long odds of kids achieving dreams of Division I baseball, let alone pro baseball. But they also balanced that with the desire to foster and encourage his passion, one that had him dressing up as his favorite player on the Colorado Rockies at the time, Dexter Fowler, for Halloween.

"Everybody wants their kid to be good, but you don't know how good your kid is," Anthony said. "He's always, in a way, surprised by what he's been able to do because you just don't know. Part of me wants to say that he's never known that he wasn't necessarily supposed to be able to do these things, but he's always been very focused."

His determination in high school mirrored what happened at GCU. While his travel club teammates made the junior varsity team at Regis Jesuit High School in Aurora, Colo., Quin was put on the freshman team and burned with motivation. A year later, he was a varsity starter on a state runner-up team.

That was the first time his parents began to wonder about a collegiate future, but even then they did not envision a program of GCU's caliber.

"The moments weren't intimidating him," Theresa said of Quin's first sophomore experience. "It wasn't too big of a moment for him to keep up with the older players mentally and physically. That really told us something."

At GCU, he was a part-time starter as a freshman and finished the season with 73 at-bats in 30 appearances.

Before he left for the Alaska League that summer, assistant coach Gregg Wallis told him he would have a chance to start as a sophomore. That was all the motivation Cotton needed to thrive in Alaska and become the 2018 WAC Player of the Year.

"A lot of freshmen would be lucky to get 70 at-bats their first year of college," Quin said. "For me, I felt like that wasn't enough. I didn't necessarily deserve more playing time, but I thought I did. It was the same type of chip on my shoulder and attitude as high school. But at the same time, those at-bats that I got gave me a lot confidence and a baseline for my college career."

This year, a pro scout approached Cotton after watching him play and described his demeanor as "unbothered." It rings true with Quin, who plays with steady motions externally even though he burns internally.

Before his senior year of high school, Quin was playing in a showcase game at a major scouting event and struck out twice on six pitches. Afterward, he told his father that he was nervous with dozens of pro scouts watching.

"It stunned me because I'd never seen him nervous and that was maybe the last time I did," Anthony said. "He's developed something about him that allows him to slow things down and stay calm in big moments like that."

His on-field success thrills the sports side of his parents, but they are just as appreciative of who he is off the field, having seen all types of athlete behavior in their careers. They relish the stories of how Quin treats younger fans and seeing how much being a teammate and leader means to him.

"I know he's very competitive and driven, but I'm glad that he understands how you make people feel and how you treat people is so important," Theresa said. "He has a great network of aunts and uncles, Smiths and Cottons, grandparents and cousins, who have given him so much support throughout this whole journey. It's really helped him on and off the field."

This week's moment is not lost on Quin. There is no certainty of when his last GCU game will be or the last time he will share a clubhouse with teammates who feel like brothers and coaches who feel like family.

But his bat seems to know what time it is -- he has a .365 average over the past 22 games.

"I am trying to enjoy every moment and take it all in stride and be grateful for what I have," Quin said. "I feel like I have a lot to look forward to in the future, but I don't want to whisk this away in any capacity. I want to enjoy every moment. These are the lasting memories I'm going to have when I'm older, having fun with these guys and getting after it."

Follow Paul Coro on Twitter: @paulcoro.

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Quin Cotton

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