Project Durham Bulls #14: Jeremy Owens

2007-2008 Durham Bulls 

Background-

I first ran into Jeremy Owens while I was in college.  He was apart of the mighty Middle Tennessee State Blue Raiders squad which competed in the Ohio Valley Conference.  I also attended an Ohio Valley Conference school.  The Padres drafted Jeremy Owens in the 8th Round of the 1999 Amateur Baseball Draft.  He had a decent run as a Padres prospect, but ended up with the Red Sox after they used a Minor League Rule 5 Draft Pick on him in 2002.  Owens best season in his professional career took place in 2003 with the Red Sox Double team in Portland where he hit 21 home runs, drove in 68, and stole 15 bases while slashing .263/.326/.484.  In 2004 and 2005 were split between time in the Red Sox Minor League system and the Somerset Patriots in the Atlantic League.  In 2006 Owens joined the Rays organization and played for the Double A Montgomery Biscuits.  The following year he ended up on the Bulls and saw action in 111 games hitting 7 home runs, 6 triples, 16 doubles, stole 15 bases while posting a .261/.298/.405 slash line.  Owens also appeared in 18 games for the 2008 Bulls, but only hit .149.  After leaving the Bulls, Owens played another seven season, all in the Atlantic League, for the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs.

Card-
Owens ended up in a whole bunch of 2001 baseball products some of which are pretty sweet cards.  Plenty of serial numbered short prints and autographs in the bunch.  Pretty good year for rookie cards with Pujols and Ichiro leading the way, probably pretty cool for Owens to end up in the same sets as those types of players.  Obviously the 2001 Jeremy Owens rookie cards are not very expensive, so I had a lot of different options to choose from....I actually picked this card because I was buying another card off of Ebay, scanned the sellers items, and picked up this card with some combined shipping costs.  The 2001 Legacy set was a pretty unique item.  The boxes came with autographed hats, never really got into the hat thing, but I have always liked these cards.  Happy to have a former Durham Bulls players on one of these nice looking cards.  Wilson Betimet, who also played for the Bulls at the end of his career, also has an autographed rookie in this set.