Keith Hernandez

Keith Hernandez
Hernandez broadcasting a Mets game in 2010
First baseman
Born: (1953-10-20) October 20, 1953 (age 63) San Francisco, California
Batted: Left Threw: Left
MLB debut
August 30, 1974, for the St. Louis Cardinals
Last MLB appearance
July 24, 1990, for the Cleveland Indians
MLB statistics
Batting average	.296
Hits	2,182
Home runs	162
Runs batted in	1,071
Teams
St. Louis Cardinals (1974–1983) New York Mets (1983–1989) Cleveland Indians (1990)
Career highlights and awards
5× All-Star (1979, 1980, 1984, 1986, 1987) 2× World Series champion (1982, 1986) NL MVP (1979) 11× Gold Glove Award (1978–1988) 2× Silver Slugger Award (1980, 1984) NL batting champion (1979) New York Mets Hall of Fame

Keith Hernandez (born October 20, 1953) is a former Major League Baseball first baseman who played the majority of his career with the St. Louis Cardinals and New York Mets. Hernandez was a five-time All-Star who shared the 1979 NL MVP award, and won two World Series titles, one each with the Cardinals and Mets.

A contact hitter with a .296 career average and a "great" walk rate of 12.5%, Hernandez's career hitting productivity was 31% above league average, by wRC+. For his defensive work he received Gold Glove awards in eleven consecutive seasons, the most by any first baseman in baseball history.

Hernandez retired as an active player after spending one year with the Cleveland Indians in 1990. Since 1999, he has served as a television broadcaster for Mets games.

Hernandez was born in San Francisco, and grew up in Pacifica and Millbrae, California. He attended Terra Nova High School in Pacifica during his freshman year, then transferred to Capuchino High School in nearby San Bruno for the remainder of his high school years. Hernandez was a star athlete in high school and graduated in 1971. One of his teammates at Terra Nova High School was future major league pitcher Bob McClure, who had also played Little League baseball with him when they were younger. (Hernandez got a game-tying two-RBI single off McClure in Game 7 of the 1982 World Series on his 29th birthday; the Cards would go on to win the game and the Series.) Given his surname, and the fact that he is from California, it was incorrectly assumed that Hernandez was of Mexican descent, and he was nicknamed Mex by his teammates. In actuality, his father's ancestry is Spanish and his mother's is Scots-Irish, as he explained during a Mets broadcast on SNY.