Roger S. Penske/Lehigh Athletics Hall of Fame
Matt McBride
- Induction:
- 2019
- Class:
- 2007
A transcendent talent on the diamond with local ties that extend beyond his time in the Brown and White, Matt McBride ’07 has represented the Lehigh Valley and City of Bethlehem fully throughout his 14-year professional baseball career.
A catcher by trade who played in 149 career games, McBride will go down as one of the best at his position in program history. He’s a career .350 hitter at the plate and accumulated 198 hits, 17 home runs, 56 doubles and 125 RBIs during his illustrious three-year career in a Lehigh uniform.
As a freshman, McBride batted .366 and led the Mountain Hawks in hits (63), doubles (20) and slugging percentage (.547). He was named to the Louisville Slugger Freshman All-America Team by the Collegiate Baseball Newspaper.
McBride earned his second of three All-Patriot League honors as a sophomore and spent the summer of 2005 playing for the Mat-Su Miners in the prestigious Alaska Baseball League.
His elite junior season in 2006 will go down as one of the single most impressive seasons in program history, where he hit .417 with 12 home runs and 61 RBIs to claim the Patriot League Triple Crown, along with a Patriot League Player of the Year award and helped guide the Mountain Hawks to their first league title and NCAA tournament appearance.
“It’s an honor to be inducted into the Lehigh Athletics Hall of Fame,” said McBride. “Joe Sterrett’s call caught me completely by surprise and I’m really excited and it’s definitely an honor to be considered and to be elected.
“I’m even more honored to be a part of a class that includes some of Lehigh’s all-time greats. To get inducted with them is truly an honor and I’m looking forward to it.”
McBride was drafted by the Cleveland Indians in the second round (75th overall) of the 2006 draft and made his major league debut on August 4, 2012 with the Colorado Rockies. He hit his first grand slam in 2014 with the Rockies before playing with the Oakland Athletics in 2016. The Bethlehem native made his return to the Lehigh Valley in 2018 after being signed by the Phillies and playing for the Lehigh Valley IronPigs for his final two seasons before hanging up his cleats at the conclusion of the 2019 season.
After exactly 1,200 games and playing the sport he loves for 14 years in all pro levels, McBride finally cements himself into the Roger S. Penske/Lehigh Athletics Hall of Fame as the 11th inducted Lehigh baseball player in program history.
“This is an unbelievably deserved honor as Matt is certainly arguably the best offensive player to play at Lehigh ever and I’m not sure there’s a more special and deserving player to coach in my time,” said Peter E. Bennett ’63 Lehigh Head Baseball Coach Sean Leary. “There is no player that I’ve coached that put more time into the batting cage and he would always do what was required from the coaching staff.
“But when the practice was done and it was time for extra work, he would just continue to hit outside until it snowed, and then he would be inside when he couldn’t be outside. Even as a professional player, he had the key to our facility because he would just go in and hit until all hours of the day. Matt certainly had the talent, but he maxed on it because he put in the time and effort in and it’s almost the hours you don’t see that made him the special player he was.”
McBride has spent 14 seasons in pro baseball able to represent the Lehigh campus and Lehigh Valley on a national level, especially during his major league stints with the Colorado Rockies and Oakland Athletics between 2012 and 2016. Being a former student athlete and playing professional sports is something just a few alumni have been able to say they did and McBride is one of them.
“It’s been a great honor to represent Lehigh on this level because I know we’ve had a lot of great athletes over the years be able to do the same thing,” McBride said. “Just being able to represent the school and show people what it means to me athletically and having that degree behind me means a lot and I’m so happy that I chose to go to Lehigh and play baseball there.”
Representing Lehigh on the national level is one thing, but being able to represent the City of Bethlehem as a whole into the Lehigh Hall of Fame is another. Getting his high school diploma from Liberty High School and signing on with coach Leary to become a Mountain Hawk has been quite the honor for the now 34-year-old.
“This campus and this city means a lot to me,” McBride said. “My grandfather used to go to all the football games and growing up here, it’s sort of in your backyard and it came full circle for me, going to high school here and then go to college right here and play baseball at Lehigh.
“I’ve just been truly lucky to have it all work out, have great coaches along the way and it’s all been such an unbelievable journey for me.”
When McBride was drafted in 2006, he was 26 credits shy of graduating. Professional baseball has become a near year-long endeavor, limiting McBride’s ability to take the classes necessary to finish his degree. An injury in 2013 allowed McBride to take a full semester load of classes, and McBride eventually did finish his degree in political science in 2018.
McBride resides in Bethlehem with his wife Catherine and daughter Magnolia.
A catcher by trade who played in 149 career games, McBride will go down as one of the best at his position in program history. He’s a career .350 hitter at the plate and accumulated 198 hits, 17 home runs, 56 doubles and 125 RBIs during his illustrious three-year career in a Lehigh uniform.
As a freshman, McBride batted .366 and led the Mountain Hawks in hits (63), doubles (20) and slugging percentage (.547). He was named to the Louisville Slugger Freshman All-America Team by the Collegiate Baseball Newspaper.
McBride earned his second of three All-Patriot League honors as a sophomore and spent the summer of 2005 playing for the Mat-Su Miners in the prestigious Alaska Baseball League.His elite junior season in 2006 will go down as one of the single most impressive seasons in program history, where he hit .417 with 12 home runs and 61 RBIs to claim the Patriot League Triple Crown, along with a Patriot League Player of the Year award and helped guide the Mountain Hawks to their first league title and NCAA tournament appearance.
“It’s an honor to be inducted into the Lehigh Athletics Hall of Fame,” said McBride. “Joe Sterrett’s call caught me completely by surprise and I’m really excited and it’s definitely an honor to be considered and to be elected.
“I’m even more honored to be a part of a class that includes some of Lehigh’s all-time greats. To get inducted with them is truly an honor and I’m looking forward to it.”
McBride was drafted by the Cleveland Indians in the second round (75th overall) of the 2006 draft and made his major league debut on August 4, 2012 with the Colorado Rockies. He hit his first grand slam in 2014 with the Rockies before playing with the Oakland Athletics in 2016. The Bethlehem native made his return to the Lehigh Valley in 2018 after being signed by the Phillies and playing for the Lehigh Valley IronPigs for his final two seasons before hanging up his cleats at the conclusion of the 2019 season.
After exactly 1,200 games and playing the sport he loves for 14 years in all pro levels, McBride finally cements himself into the Roger S. Penske/Lehigh Athletics Hall of Fame as the 11th inducted Lehigh baseball player in program history.
“This is an unbelievably deserved honor as Matt is certainly arguably the best offensive player to play at Lehigh ever and I’m not sure there’s a more special and deserving player to coach in my time,” said Peter E. Bennett ’63 Lehigh Head Baseball Coach Sean Leary. “There is no player that I’ve coached that put more time into the batting cage and he would always do what was required from the coaching staff.
“But when the practice was done and it was time for extra work, he would just continue to hit outside until it snowed, and then he would be inside when he couldn’t be outside. Even as a professional player, he had the key to our facility because he would just go in and hit until all hours of the day. Matt certainly had the talent, but he maxed on it because he put in the time and effort in and it’s almost the hours you don’t see that made him the special player he was.”
McBride has spent 14 seasons in pro baseball able to represent the Lehigh campus and Lehigh Valley on a national level, especially during his major league stints with the Colorado Rockies and Oakland Athletics between 2012 and 2016. Being a former student athlete and playing professional sports is something just a few alumni have been able to say they did and McBride is one of them.
“It’s been a great honor to represent Lehigh on this level because I know we’ve had a lot of great athletes over the years be able to do the same thing,” McBride said. “Just being able to represent the school and show people what it means to me athletically and having that degree behind me means a lot and I’m so happy that I chose to go to Lehigh and play baseball there.”
Representing Lehigh on the national level is one thing, but being able to represent the City of Bethlehem as a whole into the Lehigh Hall of Fame is another. Getting his high school diploma from Liberty High School and signing on with coach Leary to become a Mountain Hawk has been quite the honor for the now 34-year-old.
“This campus and this city means a lot to me,” McBride said. “My grandfather used to go to all the football games and growing up here, it’s sort of in your backyard and it came full circle for me, going to high school here and then go to college right here and play baseball at Lehigh.
“I’ve just been truly lucky to have it all work out, have great coaches along the way and it’s all been such an unbelievable journey for me.”
When McBride was drafted in 2006, he was 26 credits shy of graduating. Professional baseball has become a near year-long endeavor, limiting McBride’s ability to take the classes necessary to finish his degree. An injury in 2013 allowed McBride to take a full semester load of classes, and McBride eventually did finish his degree in political science in 2018.
McBride resides in Bethlehem with his wife Catherine and daughter Magnolia.
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