Hahn pitched for the Hokies from 2008-2010, striking out 76 batters in 73 innings in his final season. Hahn's first season happened to line up with my senior year at Tech, when I realized I'd been missing out on some great baseball my first three years, and so I tried to cram as many games in as I could. So many great teams in the ACC year to year, and take a look at the All-Tournament team from 2008. Yonder Alonso, Jemile Weeks, Buster Posey, Matt Harvey. So what if the Hokies finished 6-24 in conference play that year.
The Rays took Hahn in the 6th round of the 2010 draft, and traded him to the Padres in January of this year.
Back in July my family took in a Braves game against the San Diego Padres. I was disappointed in the days leading up to the game, as I thought we were going to miss Hahn pitching by a day. Luckily the lineup was adjusted and we were treated to a pitching matchup of Jesse Hahn and Alex Wood. Wood didn't have his best game, but the Braves couldn't get anything going against Hahn, who gave up just 1 run and 3 hits in 6 solid innings.
All of this to explain why Jesse Hahn appears to show up randomly on my want list. These three are the first of his I've added to my collection, and sadly even though the first card is from 2010 and the Bowman are from 2013, they appear to be the same image with some photoshopping. Disappointing, but it looks promising for Hahn getting more cards in the future. I was hoping for Topps Update, but it didn't happen. Maybe next year's Topps release?
I honestly can't believe that Hahn was left off the Update checklist. He was a legit starter for the Padres, along with fellow newcomer Odrisamer Despaigne. He's got a killer curveball and some sweet high socks. I thought at one point that he might get some NL ROY votes, but getting shutdown and put into the bullpen due to an innings limit towards the end of the year more than likely killed any shot he had of catching Billy Hamilton or whoever else is in that race.
ReplyDeleteBut yeah, I love me some Jesse Hahn. Really fun to watch that kid pitch.
I've got the base Bowman, a mini Bowman, and a sticker auto of him from that set. Don't have a lot of non-Padre uniformed autos, but I liked him enough to pick it up.