[Pinetarpress]

This was a TV release over the holidays that stumped quite a few of us....I went thru my minor league card collection for the Giants but missed this one. In the end, this wasn't a career minor leaguer but instead was a player who received cups of coffee in 1981, 82, and 83 with the big club. *I believe we had a different name down for him before it was corrected to the correct name of Jeff Ransom (I mislabeled the photo in my file and can't recall the player we thought this was)

Ransom was the Giants 5th round draft pick out of Berkley HS in 1978. In 1979, The catcher was already in AA ball as a 19 year old at Shreveport hitting .276 in 145 at bats. In 1980 he was Shreveport's main catcher batting .264 in 394 AB. He was not showing much as a power hitter as he failed to hit a single HR.

Jeff began the 1981 season with the AAA club Phoenix Giants...where, as a 21 year old, he .232 in 358 AB with 3 HR. He also received his 1st big league call up when he debuted on September 5th. He went 4-16 in 5 games getting his 1st big league hit with a single off of the Padres Juan Echelberger on October 3rd. He made the Giants out of Spring Training in 1982 and was with the big league club thru May going 7-44 with 3 RBI. He spent the season in AA batting .235.

He was back in AAA Phoenix in 1983 and received his last big league look in September going 4-20 and hitting his first and only big league HR in Cincinnati off of Bruce Berenyi. He spent 1984 in the Orioles system...1985 in the Braves system, 1987 in the Tigers org, and he closed out his career with 14 games for the Dodgers AAA club in 1988. He was out of baseball before his 28th birthday.