Shelley Duncan

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**Shelley Duncan**
Born: September 29, 1979 (1979-09-29) (age 28) Tucson, Arizona
New York Yankees — No. 17
First Baseman
Bats: Right	Throws: Right
Major League Baseball debut
July 20, 2007 for the New York Yankees
Selected MLB statistics (through June 8, 2008)
Batting average	.221
Home runs	8
Runs batted in	23
On-base plus slugging	.734
Teams
New York Yankees (2007-present)

David Shelley Duncan (born September 29, 1979, in Tucson, Arizona) is a corner outfielder/first baseman/designated hitter on the New York Yankees.

His younger brother, Chris Duncan, is an outfielder, third baseman and first baseman for the St. Louis Cardinals and his father, Dave Duncan, is the Cardinals' pitching coach and a former Oakland Athletics catcher.

1 Baseball career
2 See also
3 References
4 External links

[edit] Baseball career

[edit] High school

Duncan graduated from Canyon del Oro High School, located in the Tucson suburb of Oro Valley, in 1998. He played on the school's 1997 baseball team that went on to capture the 5A State Championship title.

[edit] College

Duncan attended the University of Arizona, where in 1999 he was a Freshman 1st team All American outfielder, and in 2001 he was a 1st team College All-American outfielder and PAC-10 Conference all star. He was selected by the Yankees in the 2nd round of the 2001 MLB Draft, 62nd overall.^[1]

[edit] Minor leagues

In 2001 Duncan had a .542 slugging percentage at Staten Island. In 2002, while playing outfield for the Greensboro Bats he had 10 assists from the outfield in 69 games, and had a .375 on base percentage.

In 2004 he hit 19 home runs in 424 at bats for Tampa of the Florida State League. In 2005 he hit a league-leading 34 home runs and had 92 RBIs for Trenton, and was an Eastern League (AA) mid-season and post-season All-Star first baseman. He was also the winner of the 2005 Eastern League All-Star Game Home Run Derby. In 2006 he hit 19 home runs for Trenton in 351 at bats, and was twice the league's player of the week.

In 2007 Duncan was a member of the International League All-Star Team, and was the Topps IL Player of the Month in May.^[2] Duncan hit .296 for the Yankees AAA team, hitting 25 home runs (2nd in the International League at the time of his call-up) with a .577 slugging percentage in 336 at bats.^[3]

[edit] Major leagues

Duncan made his MLB debut on July 20, 2007, as the designated hitter against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays, and recorded his first career hit and RBI. The next day, he hit his first major league home run against the Devil Rays, and the following day had his first multi-home run game, going deep twice in front of the Yankee Stadium crowd. Duncan later hit his fourth Major League home run at Yankee Stadium on July 31, 2007 against the Chicago White Sox.The next night Duncan hit his fifth home run in the Majors. ^[4] This caused Yankees TV announcers to joke that Duncan and third baseman Alex Rodriguez combined for a career total of 504 home runs because, at the time, Rodriguez was 'stuck' on a career total of 499 home runs.

Duncan is also joked about by announcers for his very enthusiastic high fives, brother bashes, and chest bumps in the dugout with his teammates. This led to the creation of his nickname, "Slam" Duncan. Former Yankee manager Joe Torre said in an interview with the YES Network that he tried to avoid Duncan whenever Duncan would celebrate. Following his first home run, he was interviewed by YES Network's Kim Jones, who asked him for a high five, which he enthusiastically gave her.

On August 15, 2007, Duncan hit a 2-out, 3-run home run in the bottom of the 9th inning to tie the game against the Baltimore Orioles. However, the Orioles scored three times in the top of the 10th inning off of closer Mariano Rivera to win the game. Duncan also recorded his first major-league outfield assist in the game as he gunned out Corey Patterson at home plate to keep the Orioles' lead to just three.

On August 29, 2007, Duncan was named player of the year for the Scranton Yankees.

Duncan was involved in some minor controversy on September 14, 2007, when, before the game between the Yankees and Red Sox at Fenway Park, Duncan wrote "Red Sox Suck!" along with his autograph on a 10-year-old Red Sox fan's notebook. Duncan later apologized to the boy's family, saying he got caught up in the excitement of the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry.^[5]

[edit] Spiking incident

On March 12, 2008, leading off the 2nd inning in a spring training game against the Tampa Bay Rays, Duncan reached first on a fielding error by third-baseman Evan Longoria . However, he continued on to second, where second baseman Akinori Iwamura caught the ball well before Duncan arrived. Duncan slid, raising his left foot up and spiking Iwamura high and inside of his right thigh. Iwamura sustained a cut above his right knee but was otherwise fine, and made the tag regardless. Duncan was called out and ejected. Many believe that this was in response to Elliot Johnson's aggressive hit on Francisco Cervelli, which resulted in a broken wrist for the catcher. Shortly thereafter, as the Rays and Yankees benches cleared, Rays rightfielder Jonny Gomes rushed Duncan and tried to body-block him, only to stumble and eventually be restrained. Gomes was also ejected, as were two of the Yankees' coaches, Bobby Meacham and Kevin Long. In the previous inning, Yankees pitcher Heath Phillips had been ejected for hitting Evan Longoria with a pitch.^[6]

On March 14, Duncan and teammate Melky Cabrera both received three game suspentions for their parts in incident. Rays outfielder Jonny Gomes was also suspended for his actions on the field.^[7] Each of these three players' suspensions was reduced one day in length after they decided to drop their appeal of the suspensions.

On April 9, Duncan was optioned to Triple A in order to recall shortstop Alberto Gonzalez. [1] This move was done in order to avoid placing injured stars Derek Jeter or Jorge Posada on the 15 Day Disabled List, as Duncan had a minor league option. The earliest he can return to the major league roster is on April 19.