Matt Hobgood

Matthew Micah Hobgood (born August 3, 1990) is an American former professional baseball pitcher. He was drafted 5th overall in the 2009 Major League Baseball draft by the Baltimore Orioles, but never reached the major leagues.

Hobgood was born with strep pneumonia; doctors did not expect him to survive.

He did not play organized baseball until he was eight years old. Hobgood's father, Rick, bought him a glove at age eight, and he began spending his days throwing a baseball against the slump block front of his Glendale, Arizona home. His father noticed his talent and suggested he sign up to play in a city league. At the urging of coaches, he moved over to Little League Baseball at age 11, but soon left to play travel ball after an opposing team refused to face the hard-throwing Hobgood. He hit a 300' plus home run at age 12 at Victory Lane Sports Park in Glendale, Arizona.

Hobgood's father died of cancer when Matt was 14 years old. His mother then moved herself and the children to southern California to be near her family. As a result, Matt Hobgood attended Norco High School in Norco, California, where he walked into high school knowing no one. Nicknamed Arizona by a freshman football coach, for the state from where he had just moved, he was a three-sport athlete (baseball, football and basketball), and a four-year varsity baseball player. 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. As a 6'4" 230 lb. "country strong" freshman, Hobgood played center and power forward in basketball, and was heavily recruited by the football coaches who saw him earning a future college scholarship as an offensive lineman. The heavy weightlifting workouts required of linemen were not conducive to pitching, and Hobgood opted to only play one year before giving up football to remain a pitcher.

Hobgood was a high school baseball teammate of former Major League Baseball pitcher Brandon Cunniff. He was also a baseball and football teammate of former Stanford University running back and former Jacksonville Jaguars 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, which still stand to date^[when?], 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 home run record hitting 21 home runs his senior year.

As a junior, Hobgood had a perfect 11-0 season, capped off by a pitching performance some professional scouts in Southern California deemed "the best high school pitching duel" they had seen, and which solidified Hobgood's name as a top high school pitching prospect. Hobgood beat former Orange Lutheran High School senior and current (as of 2025) New York Yankees' star pitcher Gerrit Cole in a CIF Semi-Final playoff game, in which Cole was recorded by multiple sources hitting 99-101 mph and Hobgood 95-97 mph on the radar. The Norco Cougars won 1-0 on a run-scoring single against Cole.

As a senior, Hobgood had an 11-1 record, 0.92 ERA with 101 strikeouts and just 26 walks in 68.1 innings. Along with a 95 mph fastball was a quick bat and powerful swing that produced a national-best 21 home runs to go along with a .475 average and 55 RBI.