Matt Hobgood

Matthew Micah Hobgood (born August 3, 1990, in Glendale, Arizona) is a minor league baseball starting pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles organization.

Amateur career

Hobgood was a three-sport athlete (baseball, football and basketball), and a four-year varsity baseball player at Norco High School where he led his team to back-to-back playoff appearances in the CIF Southern Section Division I baseball playoffs against Long Beach Poly in 2008 and Santa Ana Mater Dei in 2009. He played center and power forward in basketball and offensive line in football, and was both a baseball and football teammate of former Stanford University running back and current Minnesota Vikings tailback, Toby Gerhart. Despite missing nearly his entire freshman baseball season after fracturing his ankle in basketball, he set 14 season and career records at Norco, including Victories, Won-Loss Percentage, Games Pitched, Innings Pitched, Shut-outs, Runs Scored, Homeruns, RBIs, and Slugging Average. He also broke the Riverside County single season high school homerun record hitting 21 homeruns his senior year.

Hobgood was named the 2009 Gatorade National Baseball Player of the Year after being chosen as the California State Gatorade Baseball Player of the Year following a junior and senior season in which he amassed a 21-1 record on the mound and 40 homeruns.^[1]

Professional career

Hobgood was the first round pick by the Baltimore Orioles and the 5th overall selection in the 2009 Major League Baseball Draft out of Norco High School in Norco, California. He signed his first professional contract on Saturday, June 27, 2009, and began his career with the Bluefield Orioles of the Appalachian League the following day. In 2009, he had a 1-2 record with a 4.72 ERA in eight games started. He played for the Single-A Delmarva Shorebirds during the 2010 season.

References

External links

• Career statistics and player information from The Baseball Cube, or Baseball-Reference (Minors)