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Murray struggled telling A's he chose NFL: 'In my heart I'll always be an A'

Brett Deering / Getty Images Sport / Getty

Once he finally made his up his mind and picked the NFL over MLB, Kyler Murray had to have a tough conversation with the Oakland Athletics.

The A's selected Murray ninth overall in the 2018 MLB Draft but allowed him to continue playing football for the Oklahoma Sooners. That show of good faith blew up in their faces when Murray went on to win the Heisman Trophy and chose to pursue a career in the NFL. Sharing that decision with Oakland proved difficult.

"Yeah, just because they invested so much in me," Murray said Monday, according to Tyler Palmateer of the Norman Transcript.

Despite his choice, Murray still feels a connection to the first professional sports team that drafted him.

"Obviously (the Athletics) were the best throughout this whole process, letting me do my own thing, watching me play football from afar," he said. "That led me to believe how much I meant to them. Those are relationships I'll have forever. At the end of the day, they drafted me and in my heart, I'll always be an A because they took the time to do that."

Oakland may not ready to call the relationship over. The team could reportedly offer Murray a deal exceeding the monetary value of the contract he would sign in the NFL.

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