It’s America’s favorite pastime!  Win this Baseball autographed by San Diego Padres Pitcher, Jake Peavy. 

The six-foot one baseball star was born in 1981 in Mobile AL.  He bats and pitches right-handed. Jake Peavy was developed by the San Diego Padres minor league system after being drafted out of high school, where he attended St. Paul's Episcopal School. Peavy declined an offer to pitch for Auburn University in order to accept the Padres' contract offer.

In 2001, Jake was promoted to the Padres' Class Double-A team, the Mobile BayBears of Alabama. He spent parts of both the 2001 and 2002 seasons playing for the BayBears.

During his third year of major league experience in 2004, Peavy emerged as the Padres' ace starting pitcher and one of the best pitchers in baseball. He compiled a 15-6 record, struck out 173 in 166 innings and led the Major Leagues with a 2.27 ERA.  On February 28, 2005 Jake signed a four-year contract extension with the Padres. 

During the 2005 season, Peavy was selected for the National League All-Star team and ended the regular season leading the National League in strikeouts with 216 (in 203 innings). He was second in the Majors to Minnesota's Johan Santana who had 238 strikeouts. In addition he finished the season with a 13-7 record, 2.88 ERA, a strikeout-to-walk ratio of over 4:1 and WHIP of 1.044.  Peavy was the captain of Team USA in the 2006 World Baseball Classic. He started the opening game for the U.S., a 2-0 win over Mexico, giving up just one hit and no runs over three innings.  

In 2006, Peavy got off to a rocky start, in part due to mechanical adjustments brought on by various offseason injuries. Although Peavy would go only 11-14 with a 4.09 ERA, he still managed to finish second in the National League in strikeouts with 215, one shy of both his 2005 league-leading total and of the 2006 NL strikeout leader, Aaron Harang who logged 32 more innings than Peavy.

On July 1, 2007, for the second time in his career, Peavy was named to the 2007 NL All-Star Team. On July 9, he was named as the game's starting pitcher, along with Oakland's Dan Haren for the AL team.  On August 2, 2007 Peavy struck out Arizona Diamondbacks outfielder, Jeff DaVanon, for his 1000th career strikeout.  Peavy won the pitching Triple Crown in 2007, leading the National League with 19 wins, 240 strikeouts, and a 2.54 ERA. Since the divisional play era started in 1969, Peavy is only the 8th player to accomplish this feat. On October 23, Peavy won the Players Choice Award for Outstanding NL Pitcher. He added the NL Cy Young -- as a unanimous choice -- on November 15, becoming just the 10th National League player in history to win the Cy Young Award in a unanimous vote (Sandy Koufax was unanimously selected three times).  The completion of the 2007 campaign represented Peavy's sixth year in the league. Over that six-year period Peavy has already collected two strikeout champion awards, two major league ERA titles, and a unanimous, triple-crown Cy Young Award.  On December 12, 2007, he signed a 4 year extension, worth $52 million with the Padres. At the time the contract was the largest in Padres history. The contract includes a $22 million option for 2013.