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Thursday, December 10, 2020

Hot Stove: UGA's Matt Dunn

We had a special guest at the December Hot Stove meeting: former UGA shortstop Matt Dunn. Matt’s Pickens County high school coach comes to Hot Stove. Dunn graduated high school in 2002.

Dunn’s father Mickey starred at Southern Tech, hitting .370, hitting his only home run in his last college at bat. Mickey left school 12 hours short of a textile engineering degree, taking a good job as assistant plant manager of a factory making Lee jeans, near Jasper. Years later Mickey went back to earn his degree at what is now Kennesaw State, and is included in their wall of fame. Mickey gave money to KSU, and now their baseball stadium is named for him.

In 1991 Mickey scrounged World Series tickets, upper deck behind the Jumbrotron. After that he bought season tickets. Matt saw Sid slide, Otis’ catch, the World Series against Toronto – and the only ball hit completely out of Atlanta Stadium, a David Justice foul ball. Years later the Dunns met former Braves infielder Marty Perez at an event at the stadium, and stayed in touch over the years. Perez, now 74, sold insurance. He still plays golf, and often shoots his age.

Matt told of a game in high school, of a teammate giving up a legendary home run that one-hopped the hardware store across the street. In his four years of high school Matt had four baseball coaches, then three different coaches in his first three years of college. He was recruited by Vanderbilt, who offered a quarter scholarship. Virginia offered a 50% ride, so he took that.

As a sophomore Matt was the Cavaliers second-leading hitter, behind Ryan Zimmerman. That year Dunn hit a home run in his first at bat. Teammate Mark Reynolds chided Zimmerman, saying Dunn had more home runs. Unlike most players, Zimmerman started hitting more home runs when he started using a wood bat in the minors. Zim was a good guy, coming from a meager background. Several years later when Zim was called up to the majors, the Nationals were in Atlanta. Zim called Matt in Athens, asking him to pick him up at Hartsfield and give him a ride to the park. When the Nats played game seven of the World Series, Matt flew out to Houston (with Smoltz?) for the game.

The son of John Grisham was on the team at UVA, but wasn’t getting much playing time. The author went to the coach to pull some strings, but the coach said he’d lose the respect of the team if he did. John never came back to another game.

After Matt’s freshman season the head coach was fired, after many years at Virginia. In the fall of his sophomore year the new coach told Matt to not expect much playing time  Thinking he could sit on the bench closer to home, Matt started thinking about transferring. After the meeting Matt called his former East Cobb coach, who was then at UGA. After the spring semester Matt transferred to Georgia.

Matt’s roommate in Athens was lefthanded pitcher Will Startup, who later worked as a youth pastor at Parkview Baptist before enrolling at the Savannah College of Art & Design. Startup loved shoes, and went to work at Mizuno. Later Startup’s young son had cancer. Matt hadn’t seen Will in years, but pitched in with other teammates to help out. Now Startup selling painted baseballs, with the proceeds going to cancer research.

Against South Carolina the Dawgs soft-tossing lefty gave up a leadoff home run. Then the second batter homered. And the third. Then the 4th 5th and 6th batters homered. The game made ESPN SportsCenter. After losing game one, UGA won games 2 and 3 to advance to the college world series in Omaha. The team flew out on a private Gulfstream, the team plane of the Cleveland Cavaliers. After two quick losses, the team flew coach on the way home, with a two hour layover.

Matt got to play in every ACC and SEC ballpark, except LSU. He said at Ole Miss the girls are so good-looking they have to redshirt the beauty queens.

After playing shortstop his junior year matt moved to second base for his senior season, when Gordon Beckham arrived on campus. Dunn fell into some bad hitting habits at UGA, and battled for playing time. He was moved to second base, where he struggled with the different angles. But he locked down the shortstop job after going 4-4 at Turner Field, against Tech. The coach liked the team to be clean cut, but during winning streaks allowed the players to skip shaving. After a loss to Kentucky Dunn finally shaved, a painful experience.

Between Matt’s junior and senior season at UGA he played summer league in Florence SC, to get more at bats. After clubbing only one extra base hit all summer, he started to get the idea a long baseball career wasn’t to be. He majored in Economics, and after graduation in 2008 he took a job as a loan officer at a bank in Jasper, during a recession. He played lots of solitaire.

Mickey had started a company sewing grasscatcher bags for lawnmowers, and started sewing airbags for cars, since the shape was similar. During the recession they were making ten thousand bags per week. Then their main competitor went out of business, and sales went to 200,000 per week. Dad had Matt join the company to help manage the finances, and now ML Industries is the world’s largest manufacturer of airbags, with 5000 employees.

Matt took up golf, and is now a course rater for Golf Digest. He’s played Augusta National, where he likes the lack or rough, so you can usually find your ball. It’s the chipping and putting that’s harder there. He recently won the club championship at East Lake. After the first round he was tied for first, then went low in round two to win by five strokes.

He plays golf with Smoltz, who he says is ultra-competitive. On a flight together, John fell behind in a game of cards, so he wanted to continue the game after the jet had landed. Matt has also played with Chipper.

Hot Stove notes: 14 in attendance, all in masks. Jerry was back, and James Smith. Tom Curren game in late. George brought a cardboard cutout of Nomar Garciapara, and said he’s be back in January.

The Braves announced they would have four minor league teams in 2021: Gwinnett (AAA), Pearl Miss (AA), Rome (AA), and Augusta (A). The Florida Firefrogs are no longer affiliated with the Braves. During the zoom call Brian Snitker raved about the great Fans in Rome.

Chris Carpenter was at the Dawson/White game recently.

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