The Professor Lands Homerun Guest with Hunter Pence

Last updated on January 15, 2025

Garruk Wildspeaker | Illustration by Fay Dalton & Scott Okumura

Magic will be full of crossovers in 2025: Final Fantasy, Spider-Man, a third Universes Beyond Magic set by the end of the year, and who knows how many Secret Lairs.

But The Professor, from Tolarian Community College, will beat Wizards at their own game with a crossover between Commander…

… and Baseball!

That's right: former SF Giants Hunter Pence will be shuffling up and playing with The Professor next Monday.

In case baseball is not your cup of tea (you'd have to instead really love overpriced hot-dogs), Hunter Pence is pro baseball player who played for the Houston Astros, Philadelphia Phillies, San Francisco Giants, and Texas Rangers. He is a four-time All-Star (which is baseball’s version of a superhero team-up: the best players, from all teams, voted by players and managers, playing an exhibition match), has a couple of World Series, and he retired from pro baseball on September 26, 2020.

And a few months before retiring, he tweeted:

If you zoom in on the image, you can see what Hunter wants to be when he grows up…

Source: X

… an MTG Mythic Champion!

This was not just for jokes and giggles, mind you. Hunter has worn an Alpha Black Lotus necklace to a Celebrity Softball Game, and eight years ago he opened an LGS and coffee shop in Houston, where he's from. The shop, Coral Sword, is still in business. 

And Hunter's appearance in “Shuffle Up and Play” won't be the first time he plays Magic on screen… he's a MTG streamer himself!

What's more, he's a hardcore drafter (and you may guess just how much we like drafters around Draftsim). One of the highlights of Hunter's streams are the Sweatsuit Invitationals drafting league.

Source: Twitch 

Which, by the way, is how this baseball star chose to spend his 40th birthday, alongside none other than Principal Magic Designer Gavin Verhey.

Pitching College to Baseball Fans

On the other hand, if not knowing who the former SF Giants right fielder is sounds like heresy to you, but you can't help wondering why Hunter's going back to college for…

… then let me introduce Brian Lewis, better known as “The Professor”, the persona he adopts in his Tolarian Community College YouTube channel.

The Professor's one of MTG’s most influential content creators. He tends to go for a comedic flair and a focus on consumer advocacy (like reviewing the quality of card sleeves, deck boxes, and new releases), but also produces shows like “Shuffle Up and Play”, a casual gameplay series where The Professor invites guests to sit down, sleeve up, and cast some spells.

And it's in this show where Hunter will be slinging spells next Monday.

Looking Ahead

Black Lotus – Illustrated by Christopher Rush

So, what can we expect when Hunter Pence sits down to shuffle up and play with The Professor?

For starters, it’s a prime opportunity for MTG aficionados who might not follow sports to see how wide the game’s appeal truly is. His love for Magic may not be as newsworthy as Post Malone buying The One Ring… but Hunter does wear a Black Lotus as a necklace!

We know he will be playing Commander (that's one of Magic's multiplayer formats, and the most popular MTG format by a huge margin). Magic famously has five different colors, themselves tied to different strategies and personalities, so you may be asking yourself, “If I had three lives, and could be a baseball star, an LGS owner, and Magic streamer, which Magic colors would I be?”

Well…

Source: X

… you'd be Mardu.

A Mardu commander, all the way!