A Matheny I Actually Like....

The Cardinals are my Major League team of choice, but for the last few years they have frustrated me to no end at times.  More specifically, I cannot stand Mike Matheny.  I rarely voice this opinion in this space, but if you were to sit down and watch a Cardinals game with me, or follow me on social media my distain for the former Major League catcher would be a little bit more evident.  I could write a whole dissertation about specific reasons, but I am not going to get into that at the moment.  Here's one to think about....

Aledmys Diaz was one of the better rookies in baseball last year and one of the best offensive players on the Cardinals.  He spent a month batting eighth and played seven games batting ninth.

Which brings me to a Matheny I actually like.....

I was first introduced to Tate Matheny a few years ago while he was playing for the USA Baseball College team during the summer.  He's Mike's son and attended school at Missouri State where he was one of the better players in the Missouri Valley Conference.

Playing for USA Baseball means that he gets baseball cards.  Most of Matheny's cards are in the 2014 and 2015 products.  When these cards first came out they were a little pricey, but they have fallen back in price a little bit since Tate was drafted by the Red Sox.  Sounds a little bit backwards considering a lot of the USA Baseball College players end up being high end draft picks and pretty good prospects, however Matheny does not really fit into that category.

He was drafted in the 23rd round, but still actually appeared in the 2015 Bowman Chrome set.  The autograph is just as affordable as the USA Baseball signatures, so I picked one of those up too....

Cool airbrushing.  

Matheny is still just 22, but in a year and a half in the Minors is slashing .247/.295/.329 with 5 home runs, 4 triples, and 27 doubles.  Not likely to get promoted up the chain with those types of numbers. Still cool to pick up a pair of cards of a player I got to see play locally.