Wesley Garvin Hamner (March 18, 1924 – December 15, 2003) was an American

professional baseball Professional baseball is organized baseball in which players are selected for their talents and are paid to play for a specific team or club system. It is played in leagues and associated farm teams throughout the world. Modern professiona ...

player. A second baseman and

shortstop Shortstop, abbreviated SS, is the baseball or softball fielding position between second and third base, which is considered to be among the most demanding defensive positions. Historically the position was assigned to defensive specialists wh ...

, he appeared in one season ( 1945) for the

Philadelphia Phillies The Philadelphia Phillies are an American professional baseball team based in Philadelphia. They compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member of the National League (NL) East division. Since 2004, the team's home stadium has been Citize ...

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL) ...

. His younger brother, Granny Hamner, would become the Phillies' star shortstop of the 1950 "Whiz Kids"

National League The National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, known simply as the National League (NL), is the older of two leagues constituting Major League Baseball (MLB) in the United States and Canada, and the world's oldest extant professional team ...

championship team, while Garvin spent all but two months of his 11-year career in minor league baseball. The two Hamners were teammates briefly on the 1945 Phils. While Granny was the better prospect, and had a 17-year MLB career, the similarity in their names caused a mixup during the Rule 5 draft. The St. Louis Browns had scouted Granny and wanted to draft him off the Phils' Utica Blue Sox minor-league roster. But they selected Garvin's name by mistake – and Granny remained with the Phillies, for whom he would later star. Garvin Hamner, a lifelong resident of

Richmond, Virginia (Thus do we reach the stars) , image_map = , mapsize = 250 px , map_caption = Location within Virginia , pushpin_map = Virginia#USA , pushpin_label = Richmond , pushpin_m ...

, threw and batted right-handed, stood tall and weighed . In 32 Major League games in 1945, he collected 20 hits in 101

at bats In baseball, an at bat (AB) or time at bat is a batter's turn batting against a pitcher. An at bat is different from a plate appearance. A batter is credited with a plate appearance regardless of what happens during their turn at bat, but a batt ...

, including three doubles, for a

batting average Batting average is a statistic in cricket, baseball, and softball that measures the performance of batters. The development of the baseball statistic was influenced by the cricket statistic. Cricket In cricket, a player's batting average i ...

of .198. He was sent to the Atlanta Crackers of the

Southern Association The Southern Association was a higher-level minor league in American organized baseball from 1901 through 1961. For most of its existence, the Southern Association was two steps below the Major Leagues; it was graded Class A (1902–1935), ...

in June and played the rest of his career in the minors.Baseball Reference
/ref> He died at age 79 in Richmond.

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Hamner, Garvin 1924 births 2003 deaths Baseball players from Richmond, Virginia Burials in Virginia Major League Baseball second basemen Philadelphia Phillies players