Today’s Dodger of the Day is left fielder, right fielder and first baseman Matt Luke.

Matthew Clifford Luke was born February 26, 1971, in Long Beach, California. He was drafted by the New York Yankees in the 8th round of the 1992 Amateur Draft after attending El Dorado High School in Placentia, California and Cal-Berkeley. He signed with the Yankees June 18, 1992.

The Dodgers selected him off waivers from the Yankees September 25, 1997, and he spent parts of the 1998 season in Los Angeles. His Dodger debut came in an 8-5 loss at the St. Louis Cardinals April 2, 1998. Luke went 1-for-2 after entering the game in the top of the 9th for centerfielder Trent Hubbard.

Luke played left field, right field and first base for much of the first two months of the 1998 season for the Dodgers. His best game during this stint with the Dodgers came April 26 against the Cubs in Los Angeles; he went 3-for-5 with a solo shot in a 4-3 win. Luke notched 22 hits in 77 at-bats before being waived by the Dodgers at the end of May.

The Cleveland Indians claimed him off waivers June 8. He would spend 11 days in an Indians uniform, see only two at-bats: one in a 4-3 at home against Pittsburgh June 10 and another in a 4-2 loss to the Yankees in New York on the 14th.

The Indians would promptly…checks notes...sell him back to the Dodgers on the 19th.

Huh.

During his second stint (in the same season!) in Dodger blue, his numbers greatly regressed from earlier in the season. Luke slashed .213/.278/.425 over 160 at-bats, a far cry from the .286/.313/ .494 form he displayed earlier. The counting stats improved, but more than doubling your at-bats will do that for you.

His return to the Dodgers occurred in a 7-6 loss at Colorado June 20. He went 1-for-1 in a pinch-hit appearance. He had two stand-out games the rest of the season: July 4 at San Francisco and September 12 at San Diego. In the former, Luke went 2-for-4 with a double off Mark Gardner in the 9-5 Dodger victory. In the latter, Luke went 2-for-4 with five RBI in an 8-7 Dodgers loss, because baseball. His last Dodger appearance was an 0-for-1 day against Milwaukee September 27.

The Dodgers granted him free agency December 21 and the Angels signed him January 12, 1999. He played in 18 games for the Angels, mostly in the second half of 1999. They would be the final games of his major league career. His last hit was a single at Kansas City September 16 and his last appearance was September 30. Luke was a defensive replacement for Darin Erstad in the 8th inning and never saw the plate. Erstad had been selected in the 13th round of the 1992 Amateur Draft but didn’t sign.

Luke spent the first six years of his career in the New York Yankees system. His first minor league action came in 1992 with the Oneonta Yankees of the short-season-A New York-Penn League. He led the team in triples and, dubiously, GIDP. He also slashed .247/.298/.362 was the only player to see the majors.

Luke moved to the low-A Greensboro Hornets of the South Atlantic League in 1993. There, he played with a few future major leaguers including Shane Spencer, Tom Wilson and a then-19-year-old Derek Jeter. Luke led the team in hits, doubles, home runs and RBI as well as slugging percentage (functionally, anyway).

He split 1994 with the A Tampa Yankees and the AA Albany-Colonie Yankees. With Tampa, he hit .306/.385/.590 and was second on the team in home runs with 16. Tampa would win the Florida State League that year with an 80-57 record. AA Albany brought far worse numbers. He slashed .284/.363/.449 over 270 PAs.

The Yankees were still confident in Luke as they kept him in AA to begin the 1995 season with the Norwich Navigators. He slashed .260/.299/.400 in 93 games with Norwich before moving up to the AAA Columbus Clippers. Luke performed better in Columbus over 23 games, slashing .299/.325/.494. However, Luke also set a career-high for strikeouts in 1995 with 80.

Luke began the season with the Yankees...for one game. He pinch-ran for Ruben Sierra in the top of the 6th in a 5-1 win at Cleveland April 3. Then the Yankees sent him back to AAA Columbus.

He spent most of 1996 with Columbus, hitting 19 home runs and 70 RBI. Luke also returned to Tampa briefly, seeing seven at-bats for the Tampa Yankees. Not the Yankees he’d like to be playing for, I’d assume.

1997 saw Luke return to Columbus for 371 PAs before the Dodgers claimed him on waivers September 25.

Luke spent most of 1999 in the Angels minor league system. He played for the A Lake Elsinore Storm and the AAA Edmonton Trappers, briefly playing alongside Jim Edmonds and Tim Salmon in Lake Elsinore and Bengie Molina in Edmonton. He played 13 games in Lake Elsinore and six in Edmonton before receiving the aforementioned callup to the majors.

His manager in Lake Elsinore was the infamously terrible Mario Mendoza. Mendoza was somehow a better manager than batter with a .455 winning percentage over 20 seasons as a minor league manager.

The Angels granted Luke free agency October 15. The Brewers signed him December 1, but he didn’t play during the 2000 season.

He signed with the independent Long Beach Breakers for the 2001 season, notching fairly middling career numbers. Seriously, his sole season in Long Beach is almost exactly the median for his career across the board.

In 2002, he signed with Tampa and played in 29 games for the Durham Bulls. Over 122 PAs, he slashed .236/.322/.311. Luke ended his career with 19 games for the Campeche Piratas of the Mexican League.

He retired after the 2002 season. Luke is currently a realtor with his own company, Matt Luke Home Team. It manages properties in Yorba Linda, Brea, Fullerton, Placentia, Anaheim Hills and Orange, California. He is also on the Speakers Bureau for the Dodgers and Angels.