On March 6 the junior outfielder for the Georgia Bulldogs was chasing a line drive when he smacked head-on into teammate Zach Cone.

Cone walked away from the incident, but Taylor did not.

He crunched his C-5 and C-6 vertabrae, for which he had surgery the following day. Come March 11, Taylor was transferred to the Shepherd Center, a spinal cord and brain injury facility in Atlanta. He is currently rehabilitating at the Center but is still paralyzed from the waist down.

Almost three months later, the Rangers made Taylor the 1014th pick in this year’s MLB first-year player draft. With the 37th-overall selection, the Rangers took Taylor’s teammate Cone.

Taylor and Cone weren’t just outfield-mates at Georgia, they were also roommates.

“It’s an honor for me to get drafted by the same team,” Cone told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “It says a lot about the Rangers. It means a lot to JT, me, and both of our families.”

Cone’s mother, Janet, told MLB.com, ”For the last three years, whenever I’ve hung around with my son, J.T. has been there. He’s a great kid, and we love him like a son.”

Ryan Coe, in his second year as a scout for the Rangers, had reportedly followed Taylor’s career since high school – including when Taylor helped take the North Cobb (Kennesaw, GA.) High to the 5A State Final Four as a junior. Coe told Christian Red of the New York Daily News that Taylor “could really run, handle the bat. He was a really good player.”

“The kid deserved to be drafted,” Coe told the Journal-Constitution. “He was a good player for all those years. He’s somebody we had interest in had he been healthy. He deserved the recognition to be drafted … that’s all I can say.”

As a sophomore at Georgia, the 5-foot-7-inch outfielder hit .335 with a .442 slugging percentage (including 31 walks) and 29 RBIs. He also went 12-for-20 in stolen base attempts. Though before the injury Taylor’s junior season was not quite as productive (6 hits in 33 at-bats), Coe called the Ranger’s selection a “class act.”

“This was truly a classy move and a great gesture on the part of the Texas Rangers organization,” said David Perno, Georgia baseball coach.

Taylor said it was “awesome” to be picked by the Rangers because he “plays with them on the video games.”

“When I found out about (being drafted), it was a complete shock to me – ‘Oh snap I didn’t expect this to happen,’” Taylor told Maria Taylor of GeorgiaDogs.com. “When the coach first called me in, (he said) ‘Congratulations, you got drafted by the Texas Rangers.”

The Bulldog’s reaction was “You’re kidding me right,” and Perno “was like ‘Nah you’re all over TV and everything,” Taylor said. ”I thought, ‘Oh this is crazy’ so I mean I loved that.”

The junior Cron is a junior at University of Utah who earned a second-straight Mountain West Conference Player of the Year despite playing with a torn labrum on his right shoulder.

Cron started 49 games in 2011, hitting .434 in nearly 198 at-bats, reaching second base 26 times and trotting all four bases 15 more. He batted in 59 runs, on-par with his freshman year total (58) but fewer than his sophomore season (81; also, 20 homers). His OBP improved to .517 this season with the help of 31 walks, and his slugging percentage (.804) led the nation.

Cron is the first Ute to be picked in the first round – with 2008 third-round selection Stephen Fife the previous high for the university.

“He’s a true baseball guy,” Utah baseball coach Bill Kinneberg told Dirk Facer of the Deseret News. “He’s studied it. He knows it. He’s been around it.” This in part to growing up in the home of a former major-leaguer.

As for the injury, the Angels may ask Cron to go under the knife before suiting up – which would likely delay his activation until 2012. Cron told MLB.com he played through the injury in 2011 “because the doctor said I couldn’t do any more damage… It’s pretty painful when I throw, so something will have to be done eventually.”

The first baseman’s delayed start may be alright by Angels’ scouting director Ric Wilson, as LA already has the injured Kendrys Morales and rookie Mark Trumbo (who leads the team thus far with 11 home runs) at that position.

“You can never have enough depth,” Wilson told the LA Times’ Mike DiGiovanna. “You get the best guy available and let what happens happen.”

Cron can look to his father for advice on competing with a stalwart for a job, as the elder Christopher John Cron sat behind Wally Joyner. Chris Cron got in the batter’s box 15 times for the California Angels in 1991, notching two hits. Joyner hit .301 that season for the Angels in 551 at-bats.

Chris is currently managing the Erie SeaWolves, the Detroit Tigers’ Double-A Eastern League affiliate.

“It’s an unbelievable feeling right now,” the younger Cron told reporters on a conference call after being drafted Monday night. “It’s such a great organization. I’m glad that it’s over and I’m an Angel.”

His interim replacement will be Bob Melvin, with his near-.500 career at the helm and 2007 Manager of the Year honors with the Arizona Diamondbacks. The 49-year-old Palo Alto-native stands as the winningest manager in D-back’s history.

Geren spent four seasons in the dugout with the A’s, going 334-376 in his first stint as a Major League manager.

Before the recent losing streak – the A’s were swept in three consecutive three-game series’ – Oakland held a 27-27 record and sat at second place in the AL West.

On a personal level, Geren was the best man at Beane’s wedding – but the A’s general manger had to divorce himself of the skipper for the team’s recent performance. The verbal scuffle between Geren and Fuentes on May 24 certainly did not help.

“Fuentes had cited Geren’s ‘unorthodox managing’ and said he was handled ‘pretty poorly,’ thanks to ‘zero’ communication,” wrote John Shea in the SF Chronicle. Fuentes eventually said he had used the wrong outlet to voice his concern.

Three years removed from his time in Oakland, former A’s and current Rockies closer Huston Street told Shea that Geren was “my least favorite person I have ever encountered in sports from age 6 to 27.”

Though Hall of Fame hurler Dennis Eckersley chided Fuentes for speaking out - ”From the outside looking in, just pitch,” the former A’s closer told the Chronicle, “When they tell you to pitch, pitch” – the friction of the issue might well have sparked the eventual firing of Geren.

With plenty of time left in the season to overcome both the losing streak and the firing of Geren, Beane seems to be making the move in a cut-your-losses fashion rather than holding on to Geren long after his authority in the dugout ran dry.