The baseball rolled to a stop at Michael Vick's feet, and with one fluid movement he reached down, picked it up, cocked his arm, shuffled his feet and fired the ball 30 yards, dead center into the mitt of a Virginia Tech baseball player.

Forget the draft gurus. I can already tell you where Michael Vick was selected -- 30th. That's right, the Colorado Rockies took Vick with their 30th pick in last June's draft. Sight unseen, with virtually no baseball experience, someone on the Rockies staff took one look at Vick's sick once-in-a-generation physical skills and tossed a professional baseball contract at him, hoping to catch a miracle in a mitt.

Which, it turns out, is exactly how one might describe Vick's fielding acumen. When a Hokie player heaved the ball back at Vick -- who was working out in an indoor practice facility also used by the baseball team -- he simultaneously swatted at it and jumped out of the way, as if he were trying to get rid of a bee at a picnic, and nearly got beaned in the nose. "Don't worry, Mike," yelled one of his handlers, "I already signed your insurance contract."

Until infielders are issued facemasks, Vick says he'll stick with football. After all, he can fling a football 70 yards with the flick of his wrist but (attention: Rockies scouts) he can't throw a baseball more than 80 mph.

Still, the legend grows. "When he's ready, all of America is going to go: Oh, man!" ESPN's Kirk Herbstreit says. "I hate to do this to him, but I see Michael Vick as a Michael Jordan type of guy in the NFL."

Is Vick, 22, coming out too early? Absolutely. Will he need a year, or two, to bring his game up to NFL standards? Yes. But his little field-of-dreams scene helps illustrate why Vick may eventually be the one young gun in the NFL who can truly revolutionize the quarterback position. Above it all -- the huge coin, the heavy pressure, the sky-high expectations -- Michael Vick seems to possess a sense of joy that, I hope, cannot be crushed.

That will get him through the tough times he is about to face, and there is nothing tougher in sports than being a young QB in the NFL. Yet Vick doesn't shy away from the mental and physical challenges -- he covets them. And he doesn't deny his shortcomings or pass the blame -- he attacks them with a rare kind of humility and youthful exuberance that is all but extinct in today's NFL, where stars are at once untouchable and devoid of personal responsibility.

The Chargers' last savior, Ryan Leaf, knew it all and needed no one. Those kinda guys don't last long in the NFL, or anywhere for that matter. And sure enough, Leaf lost his joy for the game and then he lost his job. Vick is going to struggle, there's no doubt, but something tells me that will stoke his desire, not soak it.

I'd say the Chargers are about to draft exactly what they -- and the NFL -- desperately need: the anti-Leaf.

"I'm not scared about what I'm about to do," says Vick. "I'm about to go realize my dream and play in the NFL. Scared? Naw, I'm excited. I look forward to playing and I look forward to being successful. But I also look forward to making mistakes and learning from them and getting better because of them."

After his brief fantasy baseball camp, Vick and I walked to the VTech football locker room to talk about the upcoming draft. It was raining, yet he wore no jacket. Instead, with his shoes untied and his laundry slung over his shoulder, Vick walked through the mist, fumbling with his electronic gadgets.

I was grilling him on what I consider to be his lack of preparedness to play in the NFL, and his calm candor was disarming. In mid-answer, Vick reached to grab his chirping cell phone, and as he did so he dropped his pager (along with most of his laundry) into a puddle. He picked it up, wiped it off, shrugged his shoulders, laughed out loud and then continued right on answering one of my questions.

I didn't bother to write down his reply.

Instead I scribbled something else in my notebook:

I hope Michael Vick changes the NFL -- and not the other way around.

David Fleming, a senior writer for The Magazine, shares his perspective each week on ESPNMAG.com. E-mail flemfile@aol.com.