Jeffery Samardzija

Jeffery Alan Samardzija is a professional baseball player who plays as a pitcher in the Major League of Baseball in his home country, the United States of America. Jeffery went to the Valparaiso High School and was part of the football, basketball and baseball teams. He earned the first team All-State team place for three years while also being named the team's MVP twice, all this, just in football. He was also asked to play in the Indiana All-Star football game after his senior year.

In baseball too, he was named to the All-State first team and in college, he decided to take up both, baseball and football. While his football journey saw two seasons on the bench, he only managed to get his first start in his sophomore year however, in 2005, he had a wonderful year with 77 catches and 15 touchdowns. He covered 215 yards and made it to a number of All-American teams.

He stopped his football career short after getting picked by the Chicago Cubs in the MLB draft. His initial plans of playing in the NFL and the MLB were dropped after picking up the deal.

Chicago Cubs put Jeffery into the A-league, for the Boise Hawks and ended up with a 2.37 ERA and a 1-1 record in 2006. He moved to Peoria in the later part of the summer and he had a 0-1 record before deciding to go back to the University of Notre Dame for his Senior year. In 2007, Jeffery decided to commit to baseball after signing a full-time contract for 5-years.

Jeffery began his season with A-Daytona and went for 3-8 and had a 4.95 ERA. He moved up to the AA-league in Tennessee and made six starts to end with a 3-3 record that saw him record a 3.41 ERA. Still on the upward climb, Jeffery moved to the AAA-Iowa league and had a 4-1 record for a 3.13 ERA and had 40 strikeouts with 16 walks.

Finally in 2008, he moved up to the Chicago Cubs and took the place of Kerry Wood who was injured. His debut was impressive enough to draw a quote from his manager where he said that Jeffery might never again need to play in the minor leagues again.