Grand Opening
It started innocently enough, with Kyle Schwarber hitting a 7th-inning grand slam to propel the Cubs to a 5-3 win against the rival Cardinals. Thanks to Joe Maddon now batting the pitcher eighth, Schwarber was the first Cubs non-pitcher to hit a slam batting ninth since pinch hitter Julio Zuleta did it on June 5, 2001, also against the Cardinals.
That, however, was a game the Cubs were already leading 8-5. Schwarber's slam was the first go-ahead version by a Cubs #9 hitter, in the 7th or later, since Earl Averill gave them a lead against the Braves on May 12, 1959.
Averill was also pinch-hitting, as were all such slams before him. Schwarber was the first starter in team history to hit such a slam out of the 9-hole.
A Long Time Coming
Edinson Volquez had already made Miami Marlins history two starts ago, specifically by losing. Again. To drop his season record to 0-7. He joined one Joe Fontenot in 1998 as the only Marlins starters ever to be 0-7; the 21-year-old Fontenot was drafted out of high school, made only eight starts in his MLB career, spent the '99 season at triple-A Calgary, and then retired.
Volquez finally won his previous start to avoid setting a dubious team record, but on Saturday it finally clicked against the Diamondbacks. Volquez issued just two walks-- and retired both runners on double plays-- to finish off the first no-hitter since Jake Arrieta's offering last April 21. That span of 408 days was the longest between NH's since we went the entire 2005 season and most of 2006 without one. Oddly, that drought was also broken by a Marlins no-hitter against Arizona, by Anibal Sanchez (September 6, 2006).
One of our favorite quirks here at Kernels is the concept of a "faced minimum". It's a 27-batter game that is not a no-hitter, and it's very rare. (A perfect game, by definition, is both.) Although Volquez's game doesn't qualify (because it was an NH), it goes down as just the ninth no-hitter in history to involve only 27 batters. Justin Verlander threw the last one on May 7, 2011... but only three of those nine have involved multiple baserunners. Volquez duplicated the feat of Warren Spahn on April 28, 1961, walking two and retiring both on double plays. The first such game belonged to Gus Weyhing of the Philadelphia Athletics (the old American Association team, not today's Oaklanders) who walked one and hit one, but had both runners caught stealing, on July 31, 1888.
Grand Central
While we were busy paying attention to Volquez's quest (which is worth a ridiculous number of points in Scrabble, incidentally), the Dodgers and Brewers were busy trading grand slams in Milwaukee. Travis Shaw hit the first one of his career in the 7th inning, but Chris Taylor answered that in the top of the 9th for a 10-8 Dodgers win. It was the third game in Miller Park history where both teams hit a slam; the last was on April 21, 2015, against the Reds. In that contest Elian Herrera had been the previous Brewer to hit one in a loss, because the Reds hit two of their own in the same game. The other contest where the teams traded was June 20, 2007, against the Giants.
Taylor added a double and a single to become the first Dodger with three hits including a slam since... Chris Taylor on May 8 against the Pirates. Combined with a similar performance last July, Taylor is already nearing the record for most such games in Los Angeles Dodgers history (1958). Mike Piazza did it five times, while Matt Kemp had four (and was also the last to do it twice in a season, in 2009).
Smashing Adams
Speaking of the Reds, they fell behind the Braves on Saturday when Matt Adams hit the team's first slam of the year in the 5th inning. However, an inning later they would hang a 4-spot (surprisingly not on a grand slam) and eventually send us to extras tied at 5. Matt Adams already has a place in baseball history for being the first player to homer twice in the 12th inning or later of the same game, a feat finally duplicated by Chris Davis a few weeks ago.
So of course Adams comes up in the top of the 12th and hits his second homer of the game, a solo shot that stood up for a 6-5 win. He thus became the first hitter in Braves team history (1876) to have a grand slam in "regulation" and a second home run in extra innings. The last to have a 2-HR, 5-RBI game, with the second homer in the 12th or later, was Wally Berger-- also against the Reds-- on July 23, 1935. (Berger had a 3-run, a solo, and an RBI single, no slam.)
Intermission
At some point Ian Desmond hit a slam in San Diego too. We don't have any great notes about that, but props.
More Zeroes In The Hit Column
Of course most of those slams are going to drift off into dusty scorebooks, but when Albert Pujols came up with the bases loaded in the bottom of the 4th on Saturday night, you just knew this day was about to become unmatched. With one swing Pujols created three pieces of baseball history, becoming not just the first player to hit a grand slam for his six hundredth career homer, but no player had ever done it for five hundred either. (And Carlos Delgado is the only one to hit a slam for #400.) Combined with Volquez earlier, it was the first day in major-league history that had seen a no-hitter and a player hit career HR #500, 600, or 700.
Pujols would end the game with just that one very notable hit, the third time in his career (2,477 games) that's happened. His other games where his only hit was a slam were against the Mets on August 10, 2002 (career homer #62) and the Cubs on April 25, 2009 (#326).
And if you've been counting along, it was the sixth grand slam of Saturday's slate, tying the major-league record for a single day. That was set back on May 21, 2000, when the coincidences included one hit by the Angels in Anaheim (Garret Anderson), one hit by the Dodgers (actually two, Adrian Beltre and Shawn Green), and one hit at Miller Park (J.T. Snow of the Giants). Shawn Green, of course, would go on to have a four-homer game at Miller Park a couple years later, but never hit a slam there.
Grand Total
And alphabetically last but not least, just when it looked like things might be calming down, Mike Zunino of the Mariners put the bow on the package with the seventh slam of the day, setting the all-time record that had been tied just 18 minutes earlier. It was the first slam of his career, and it makes him the second-to-last player alphabetically ever to hit one. And for once the answer is not Dutch Zwilling, who never hit one in his seven-year career from 1910-16. It's outfielder Bob Zupcic who played most of the 1992 and 1993 seasons for the Red Sox and hit two slams, 10 days apart, right before the '92 All-Star break.
Zunino already had a two-run double and an RBI single prior to the slam, making him just the second player in Mariners history to record a 7-RBI game while batting 9th. Brian Giles had a slam and a three-run homer at Rogers Center on May 17, 1990.
Logan Morrison capped the scoring in that game for the Rays with a meaningless 9th-inning solo shot. Meaningless except for it being his one hundredth career homer. Let's hope that 500 homers from now, we can match the excitement of June 3, 2017.
Bottom Of The Bag
Still more just from Saturday!
⋅ Jason Grilli: First pitcher in Jays history to allow four homers and record fewer than three outs. Last in the majors was Travis Harper of the Rays, also versus Yankees, June 21, 2005.
⋅ Ryon Healy & Jed Lowrie: Second Athletics teammates in live-ball era to each have a homer and two doubles in same game. Reggie Jackson and Sal Bando did it in Anaheim on the day of the moon landing (July 20, 1969).
⋅ Ben Lively, Phillies: First pitcher (for any team) to throw 7+ innings in his MLB debut, strike out zero, and get the win, since Anthony Telford of the Orioles on August 19, 1990.
⋅ Tyler Chatwood, Rockies: Second pitcher in team history to throw 8+ innings, strike out 8+ opponents, have two hits at the plate, and score two runs. Other was John Thomson in a five-hit shutout of Milwaukee on September 30, 2001.
Did You Know?
If Logan Morrison continues to play the same number of games each season (an average of 101 not counting his rookie half-season), and hit homers at the same pace (one every 7.7 games), the date you want to circle for his 600th is July 17, 2055. He will be 67.
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