Southern Miss baseball players have njoyed success in professional baseball, as former Golden Eagles can be found
on major league and minor league rosters.
With 10 former standouts currently playing
professionally, Southern Miss’ reputation for
training and producing professional caliber
talent each year has steadily increased.
Southern Miss has had 66 players drafted
74 times since 1966, including 17 in the
top 10 rounds and 11 in the top five rounds.
The Golden Eagles had two players (Tommy
Davis – 1994; Brandon Parker – 1997) get
drafted in a program-high second round.
Former standout B.A. Vollmuth was chosen
in the third round by the Oakland Athletics
in the 2011 MLB First-Year Player Draft.
The Golden Eagles have had at least one
player drafted in 11-straight years (2001-11),
including four in 2006, 2008, 2009, and
2011, five in 2004 and three in 2003.
Fifteen players have played in at least one
major league game. Southern Miss has had
three players who finished in the Top 25 voting for either American or National League
Most Valuable Player honors.
Five Golden Eagles have helped lead
their respective teams to 13 American or
National League Division Championships,
including three players who played in the
World Series.
Jim “Peanuts” Davenport played 13 years
in the major leagues with San Francisco
(1958-70), and was one of
the top vote leaders in the
National League MVP voting
in 1962. In that same year,
he won a gold glove at third
base, was named to the all-
star team and helped lead the
Giants to the World Series.
Chad
Bradford
John Bale
Jim Davenport
Tommy Davis
Jarrett Hoffpauir
Bob McCrory
Pat Rapp
Bill Selby
Kevin Young
Championship that year and an appearance
in the World Series.
Kevin Young played 12 years in the
major leagues with Pittsburgh (1992-95,
Chad Bradford has played 12 years
in the major leagues with Chicago,
AL (1998-00), Oakland (2001-04),
Boston (2005), New York, NL (2006)
Baltimore (2007-08) and Tampa Bay
(2008-09). He helped lead the White
Sox to a Division Championship in
2000, the A’s to two Divisional titles
in 2002 and 2003 and the Mets in
2006. He also helped the A’s to the
ALDS in 2001 and the Red Sox in
2005. He became the third former
Golden Eagle to pitch in the World
Series in 2008 for the Rays.
Jarrett Hoffpauir is the latest former
Golden Eagle to get the call, playing in eight games for the St. Louis
Cardinals in 2009. He saw action in
2010 in 13 games for the Toronto Blue
Jays and currently is in the Washington
Nationals system.
