Bienvenido A Miami
Dan Straily threw eight strong innings for the Marlins in Friday's opener against the Blue Jays, departing with a 5-1 lead after Aaron Sanchez had a couple rough innings in the middle. On comes Kyle Barraclough, who had a remarkable streak earlier this season of not allowing a hit in 12 straight appearances. That was then, this is now. Two singles and a walk later, on comes Drew Steckenrider, who had his own streak of not allowing a run for 22 games prior to the All-Star break. He gets Aledmys Diaz to strike out, but then walks Devon Travis to make it 5-2. And welcome pinch hitter Justin Smoak. You know we wouldn't be mentioning this if he hadn't promptly hit a grand slam to flip the game from 5-2 to 6-5, which Ken Giles then saved in the bottom of the 9th. In Blue Jays history it was only the 10th go-ahead grand slam in the 9th inning or later; only six of those came while the team was trailing, and only two others were when Toronto was down to its final out. Those were by Dave Winfield on May 7, 1992 (at Seattle), and Gregg Zaun against the Rays on September 6, 2008.
Smoak also hit only the fourth pinch-hit grand slam in Jays history, and none of the others either came in the 9th inning or took the lead. Reed Johnson (2005), Tony Fernandez (2001), and Jesse Barfield (1982) are the list. You also still probably remember David Bote's dramatic walkoff slam for the Cubs on Sunday Night Baseball a few weeks ago; that was also as a pinch hitter, as was Daniel Robertson's walkoff for the Rays (also against the Marlins-- off Barraclough) on July 22. That gives us three go-ahead pinch-hit slams this season when teams were down to their final out; that hasn't happened three times in a major-league season since 1961. The Marlins are also the first team ever to give up two such slams in a season.
And Smoak wasn't quite done; he hit another 9th-inning homer in Saturday's game at Marlins Park, although that one wasn't quite as dramatic. The Jays trailed 6-1 at that point and it was "only" a two-run shot with Lourdes Gurriel on second. So while he didn't turn that game around and Toronto still lost, Smoak did become the first player in Blue Jays history to hit a multi-run homer in the 9th inning or later in back-to-back team games. Two players had done it two games apart, Junior Felix in 1989 and Tony Bautista in 2000.
Sweet Home(r) Alabama
The Padres and Rockies have been known to play some long games, including a 22-inning lovefest in 2008 which, thanks to the time difference, ended at 4:20 am Eastern. So when they got stuck on 2-2 after six innings on Thursday, gulp. As we've mentioned before, if a game is like 8-8, you feel pretty confident that somebody's gonna score soon. 1-1 and 2-2, not so much. In fact the teams went to extra innings with only three hits between them after Eric Lauer briefly threatened to throw the first no-hitter in Padres history. Unfortunately, he was coming off a DL stint and was already at 81 pitches through five innings, so even though he hit for himself in the 6th, Trey Wingenter-- of Huntsville, Ala., hence our section header-- gets summoned and promptly gives up the first base hit of the game. Alas, it wasn't a homer. That would wait until Franmil Reyes finally went deep off Bryan Shaw for a walkoff in the bottom of the 13th. It was the Padres' first walkoff homer, in any inning, during the 2018 season, leaving the Marlins as the final team to not hit one yet. Despite that 22-inning game, and a pair of 14's since then, it was also the Padres' latest walkoff anything against the Rockies, and tied for the fifth-latest against any opponent. The leader in that category remains Adrian Gonzalez's winner in the 18th against the Reds on May 25, 2008-- barely five weeks after the 22-inning affair.
As for that no-hit bid, Lauer became just the fourth starter in Padres history to depart a game in the 6th inning or later with a no-hitter intact. Aaron Harang in 2011 got through six innings, but needed 95 pitches to do it; the bullpen came one out from history before Juan Uribe doubled off Luke Gregerson in the 9th. Andy Benes did it on August 3, 1991, helped by a retroactive scoring change, but Ron Gant led off the 8th with a homer regardless. And on July 21, 1970, in the Padres' second season in the majors, Clay Kirby went eight no-hit frames before being lifted for a pinch-hitter. Jack Baldschun promptly gave up a single to start the 9th. That would be the first of five Padres no-hitters to get broken up in the 9th, and who'd'a thunk that 48 years later, we'd still be waiting for them to finish one. No word on whether Clay Kirby understands it yet or not.
Home(r) On The Range(rs)
Once we figured out the theme for the week, we were kinda hoping Texas would do something unusual so we could drop this section title. Yeah, they did. They dropped a Texas-sized thumping on the Twins in Sunday's series finale, starting with two runs off reliever Gabriel Moya as Minnesota jumped on the "opener" bandwagon. But the real mess came in the bottom of the 6th when Robinson Chirinos hit a two-run homer to chase Zack Littell off the mound. Cue Tyler Duffey, who gives up four more hits and gets burned by a Chris Gimenez error at first base. (Spoiler alert, this will not be the last mention of Chris Gimenez.) Nomar Mazara homers for the fifth run off Duffey (it's suddenly 10-0 if you're counting), Matt Belisle comes into the game and plunks the batter (Adrian Beltre) right after the guy who hit the home run. Ah, unwriten rules. And in perfect symmetry, after Belisle gets ejected, the next batter, Jurickson Profar, hits another home run off Alan Busenitz. Even in the days of September callups, we're deep into Twins Territory as far as who's going to pitch next. Remember we already used a reliever to begin the game. So it certainly doesn't help when Addison Reed starts squawking about balls and strikes and he gets ejected at the end of the 7th. By now it's 13-2 and let's just give the ball to... oh yeah, Chris Gimenez is still out there. He actually pitched six times last season in blowouts. Get over here, Chris, make up for that error.
Uh, yeah, not so much. It's inconsequential at this point, but first batter Nomar Mazara homers again. Three more singles and then Drew Robinson unloads a three-run homer. When Gimenez finally gets out of the inning he's given up five earned runs, it's 18-2, and another spoiler alert, we won't have to play B9. All told the Rangers collected six homers, their first home game doing so since August 20, 2008, in a 9-1 win over Detroit. Their 13 extra-base hits set a team record (the only game with 12 was another blowout of Minnesota on September 13, 1986). Mazara and Profar ended up with three each out of those 13, the first Rangers teammates to do that since Rusty Greer and Warren Newson at Fenway Park on June 15, 1996. And it was the sixth time in Rangers/Senators history that seven different players had at least one extra-base hit, at least one run scored, and at least one RBI. The last of those was yet another blowout of Minnesota, this time a 20-6 affair on July 25, 2011.
As for Gimenez, those five earned runs weren't terribly unique as far as position players go, but recall that Willians Astudillo, the rookie phenom who managed to play six positions in 10 games during a brief July callup, also gave up five runs in his lone pitching appearance on July 14. Although Paul Janish of the Reds did it twice by himself in 2009, the combination of two players makes the 2018 Twins the first team ever to have two different position players give up five earned runs in the same season, at least since the leagues began tracking ER in 1912.
So how does one make up for a two-run fielding error and a five-run pitching performance? Well, here's a start. And in an 18-4 game, it's somewhat fitting that the part everyone will remember is how Chris Gimenez became the first Twins "pitcher" to homer since before the designated-hitter rule was adopted. Whether you prefer any homer (June 11 at Cleveland) or a multi-run homer (May 14 versus Milwaukee), the record that had stood since 1972 belonged to the great Jim Kaat.
Back Home(r) Again In Indiana
Okay, we know there hasn't been a major-league team in Indiana since 1914, but Cincinnati is fairly close, and the Milwaukee Brewers had to take their covered wagons full of bats and balls and water canteens across the rugged mountains of Indiana (this is false on multiple levels) to meet the Reds at Great American Ball Park this week. And there's always one series like this.
The Reds wasted no time in Tuesday's opener, knocking Junior Guerra around for eight hits and six runs before forcing him out of the game in the 2nd inning. The last Brewers pitcher to give up 6+ runs and get ≤ 4 outs was Dave Bush at Minnesota on May 21, 2010, but notably it's the third straight start where Guerra has hit the "8 and 6" marks, regardless of innings. Only seven hurlers in team history have pulled that off, and the previous one was Ruben Quevedo in June 2002.
Christian Yelich would start a miniature Brewers comeback with a solo shot in the 6th to make it 6-2, and after Cincinnati stranded the bases loaded in their half, Yelich added a three-run shot in the 7th to get to within 7-6. Scooter Gennett's two-run triple would put things away in B7, however, making Yelich the first Brewers player with two homers and five RBIs in a loss since Aramis Ramirez did it in St Louis on May 17, 2013. Jose Peraza had four hits and four runs scored for the victorious Reds despite only having one extra-base hit, the first Cincinnati player to do that in a home game since Dave Collins against the Mets on May 13, 1980.
Wednesday felt like a fairly normal game at first, despite the Brewers opening with two runs and then Billy Hamilton hitting a leadoff homer in the bottom of the 1st. Christian Yelich makes it 4-3 in the 5th with another homer, his third hit of the game already, but it's the bottom of that inning where the wheels start to fall off. Josh Hader-- whose streak of high-strikeout games is the second-most-memorable thing about his season-- gives up a two-run double and then a two-run homer and it's 7-5 Reds. Michael Lorenzen gives up a double to Yelich in the 6th, plus a sac fly (7-6), and then bats for himself in the bottom half. With two runners on. Yep, of course he does. It's now 10-6 Reds and Lorenzen has his fourth home run of the season, the most ever by a Cincinnati pitcher (including pinch-hit appearances). The most recent with three had been Micah Owings in 2009, and Wednesday's homer was also Lorenzen's second this year to score either 3 or 4 runs. We are still talking about his pinch-hit grand slam on June 30, which was also against the Brewers. No Reds pitcher in team history (1882) had hit multiple 3- or 4-run homers in the same season.
Oh of course we're not done. The Brewers respond by hitting for a team cycle in the top of the 7th, capped by Yelich's triple to make it 10-10. If you're following his plot line through this story, that's single-homer-double-triple-- the eighth cycle in team history and just the second to end with the triple (Robin Yount, June 12, 1988). The previous Brewers cycle had been by George Kottaras on September 3, 2011, notable because, one, he's a catcher, and two, it was the first cycle of that MLB season, sparing us the first cycle-free season (this is still true) since 1983. It was also the second cycle at GABP, the other being by Randy Winn of the Giants on August 15, 2005.
Mike Moustakas then puts Milwaukee out in front with a homer in the 8th before Joakim Soria uncorks a replay-overturned wild pitch to re-tie the game at 11. And did you think we were done trading runs? Ha. Both teams managed to hit leadoff homers in the 10th (Jesús Aguilar and Brandon Dixon), just the second game in the past six seasons where that's happened (Josh Phegley & Mike Trout did it last April). That would have sent us to the 11th, except that Hernan Perez also doubled and scored in T10 after Aguilar's dinger, giving us a merciful final score of 13-12 in 10 innings.
Moose's homer was his fourth hit of the game, making him and Yelich the first teammates in Brewers history with four hits, three RBIs, and a home run in the same game. But perhaps we have buried the lead. Yelich had another meaningless infield single in the 9th, finishing not just with a cycle, but with a 6-for-6. Since the mound was moved to its current 60½-foot distance in 1893, only five players have had a six-hit game that included a cycle: Then-Ranger Ian Kinsler in 2009, Rondell White of the Expos in 1995, Detroit's Bobby Veach in 1920, and Sam Thompson of the 1894 Phillies. Only three other players in Milwaukee baseball history-- including the Braves and all those 19th-century teams-- have posted six hits in a game: Jean Segura in 2013, Kevin Reimer in 1993, and John Briggs in 1973. And Yelich is the first player, for any team, to have a six-hit game in the Queen City since Walker Cooper against the Cubs on July 6, 1949.
Remember way back when Josh Hamilton started this with a leadoff homer? Turns out he's the first Reds leadoff batter with four hits and three runs scored in a loss since Johnny Wyrostek against the Cubs on May 28, 1948. And only other player in team history had led off with a homer in a game where the Reds would score 12+ runs but still lose. That was only Pete Rose, also against the Cubs, on July 28, 1977.
The proverbial "they" always says this about day games after extra-inning night games, but Thursday was a much calmer affair, one of those annoying 1-1 games where someone please wake up and score. That finally fell to Lorenzo Cain in the top of the 11th, who hit the Brewers' first homer on the road in the 11th or later since Jonathan Lucroy went deep at Citi Field on June 12, 2014. Every other team except the Angels had connected for one since then. It was also the latest one the Brewers have ever hit in Cincinnati. The 2-1 final also marked the ninth set of back-to-back games in Brewers history where both were on the road, both went to extras, and Milwaukee came out on top in both. They last did it in their final two (otherwise-meaningless) games of the 2016 campaign at Coors Field.
Yelich, by the way, must have figured that two homers on Tuesday and six hits on Wednesday would tide him over for a while, because he sleepwalked through an 0-for-4 on Thursday afternoon. On the up side, he's the first player since Sammy Sosa on June 30 and July 2, 1993, to have two homers in one game and six hits in the next. On the down, of those five people we mentioned above to have six hits including a cycle since 1893, Yelich is the only one who failed to get a hit in the game after that.
But no worries, he got one last lick in on Sunday, taking his frustration out on Washington (and really, wouldn't we all like to do that?) with a grand slam to cap a seven-run 5th inning. Only one other player for any Milwaukee team (including all the 19th-century ones) has ever hit a grand slam in Washington, against the Nationals or any of their old teams (including all the 19th-century ones). That happened way back in... well, the Obama adminstration. It was April 18, 2010, when current manager Craig Counsell was still a player and took Miguel Batista deep in a 10-run 1st.
And if you think Yelich won't somehow be named the NL Player Of The Week, consider those three feats. In well over 200,000 MLB games there have been 321 cycles, 166 six-hit games, and plenty of grand slams, though they're uncommon enough that they're still fun. Even accepting that Yelich did two of the three in the same game, he's the first player in history to accomplish all three of them in a week. The previous record-holders were Rondell White of the Expos, who did it in 15 days in 1995, and Dave Orr of the 1885 New York Giants who did it in 16. Like Yelich, each of them also had the cycle in their six-hit game and added the grand slam on either side of it.
Home(r) At The Bat
Which is, of course, the title of a famous episode of "The Simpsons", clips of which used to play at one of our local minor-league parks all the time. Intermission! (And the right-hand nav bar has jumps to the other segments. Don't spend too long.)
The Home(r) That Ruth Built
You still sometimes hear this name applied to the new version of Yankee Stadium, even though it originally referred to the one that's now a rec field across 161st Street. Either way it had a couple interesting home runs hit in it this week, the most interesting one (certainly for the home team) being Neil Walker's pinch-hit walkoff on Tuesday. The Yankees were one of three teams who hadn't recorded any pinch-hit home run this season (the AL tends to use less of them); the others are Detroit and Seattle. And the Yankees' last pinch-hit walkoff homer was also their last walkoff win of any kind against the White Sox; Brian McCann hit a three-run job off Jake Petricka on August 24, 2014. However, the Yankees' last solo pinch-hit walkoff homer was by Bob Cerv to beat the Tigers on August 2, 1960.
The other, non-homer-related, quirk about Tuesday's game is that the Yankees scored five runs and had eight hits, and all of them were by different players. (Some, such as Walker, had one of each, but nobody had two of either.) We can pretty much guarantee that the last time the Yankees did that, no one noticed. Because while six different players scored their six runs, and eight different players had their eight hits, against Montreal on July 18, 1999, it's the other side of that boxscore that matters. You may recognize the date as being David Cone's perfect game.
Thursday brought the Tigers to the (now-northwest) corner of River Avenue and 161, and Jeimer Candelario wasted no time, putting Detroit on top with a leadoff homer against J.A. Happ. It was the second leadoff dinger of Candelario's career; both have been this season, and both have been off J.A. Happ. Except the other was on June 2 when Happ was still with Toronto. The only other batter to hit two against Happ at all is Brett Gardner, who at least for the time being, can't hit any more since they're now teammates. Austin Jackson, off CC Sabathia on August 17, 2010, is the only other one the Tigers have hit at the new stadium.
However, the Yankees beat up on Francisco Liriano for five runs and eventually took a 7-5 lead into the 9th, summoning Dellin Betances for the save. Mmm, not so much. Betances did have a "three true outcomes" inning, with every batter recording either a walk, a strikeout, or a home run (i.e., giving the defense absolutely nothing to do). Problem is the breakdown of those three. A walk to Nick Castellanos was followed by back-to-back homers from Victor Martinez (his second of the game) and Niko Goodrum for an 8-7 Tigers victory. Betances is the first Yankee pitcher to give up multiple homers in the 9th or later and get both a blown save and a loss since Dave Righetti did it against the Brewers on June 14, 1987. (For the curious, the one time Mariano Rivera gave up multiple homers and lost, he had come in with the game already tied, so no save chance.)
The trading of the lead multiple times got Happ off the hook despite giving up 10 hits and three homers; he's the first Yankees pitcher to do that and not take the loss since Carl Pavano did it in a 13-9 comeback win against Seattle on May 11, 2005. Meanwhile, Victor Martinez-- whose first homer had done one of those flips in the 5th inning, turning a 3-4 deficit into a 5-4 lead-- was the first Tigers batter in a half-century to hit multiple homers in the 5th or later, both with Detroit trailing, and both of which at least tied the game. You might have heard of the previous guy to do it-- Al Kaline against the Red Sox, June 8, 1966.
Be Home(r) By 11
And speaking of the Red Sox, they garnered a couple interesting nuggets this week, also starting on Tuesday when a fairly nondescript 4-1 game with the Marlins suddenly became 6-4 thanks to a Matt Barnes four-run implosion in the 8th. That would actually have put Kyle Barraclough (remember him?) in line for the win, except that Tayron Guerrero said, I'll see your implosion and make it 7-6 again. And then Craig Kimbrel said, hey, I can blow saves too, let's make this 7-7 and start over. It was the seventh game in the majors this season with three blown saves (no one's hit four yet), but the fun was only beginning. After two singles in the bottom of the 9th, Eduardo Nuñez grounded into what should have been a 10th-inning-inducing double play, but, well, oops. The last time the Red Sox walked off on an error was May 29, 2014, when Xander Bogaerts singled to third, Chris Johnson tried to at least get one out by throwing to second, but the Braves' Tommy La Stella missed the catch, the ball rolled away, and Jackie Bradley scampered home. The Marlins have committed just six walkoff errors in their history, and two are this season (Miguel Rojas at Padres, May 30).
Matt Barnes (remember him?) got bailed out in all the lead changes; he is the first Red Sox pitcher this year to blow a save, get one out, give up four runs, but not also get the loss (recall, a save situation is three or less, so if you give up four, you must end up trailing). Turns out the previous Sawx pitcher with that line... was Matt Barnes, two years earlier to the day against Kansas City. Since saves became official in 1969 he's just the third pitcher to do it twice, and the others did it for different teams: Al Hrabosky in 1976 and again in 1979, and Todd Jones in the mid-2000s.
Starlin Castro homered off Barnes for part of that messy inning, after he had already tripled to lead off the 4th (but somehow not scored, and they lost by 1). Justin Ruggiano (2012) and Juan Encarnacion (2003) are the only other Marlins to record a triple at Fenway Park, where they don't visit much, and Castro is the first visiting player, for any team, with a homer and a triple in a loss there since Emil Brown of the Royals on August 3, 2005.
The finale of the three-game set was less in doubt after Boston unleashed a 15-batter 7th inning and recorded its first 11-run frame since May 7, 2009, against the Indians. It was the first 11-run inning in the majors this season, and just the second time in the past 25 years that the Red Sox collected 10 base hits in one turn. The other of those games was June 27, 2003, in a 14-run 1st against the Marlins.
Miami managed to go through four pitchers in the inning, with Javy Guerra finally getting the last two outs when Andrew Benintendi grounded into a double play. Still he-- like the three before him-- gave up at least two runs, the first time in Marlins history where four consecutive pitchers in a game had surrendered 2+ runs while getting ≤ 2 outs. Only once before had four Marlins done it at all in a game (non-consecutive); that was the famous 18-17 walkoff loss at Colorado on July 4, 2008.
Mookie Betts collected three hits, three runs, and three RBIs along the way, his ninth time doing that as Boston's leadoff hitter. That ties him with Alfonso Soriano for the all-time MLB record for having all those 3's out of the leadoff spot; Johnny Damon and Rickey Henderson each did it eight times. But the most fun nugget probably belongs to Benintendi. Sure, he ended the threat of any more runs by grounding into that double play. But nine batters and seven runs earlier, he also bunted Betts to third as the Sawx looked for an insurance run in what was then a 7-5 contest-- thereby starting all three outs in the same inning.
It's been pointed out that lots of batters have started all three outs, because there have been over 700 triple plays in MLB history. And because of the myriad of ways any batter could make that first out, we had to restrict the search to what we are calling the Benintendi Special-- a sac bunt for the first out and a double play for the last two. But in the population of available play-by-play since 1933, when GIDP was first tracked by the league offices, there has not been an inning with that particular combo (which is why we are entitled to called it the Benintendi Special). There have been occasions where the batter in question hits a sac bunt, but ends up being safe on an error, and that's how the floodgates opened on the big inning. But the closest parallel we could find was by Ron Washington on September 24, 1984; he reached on a sac bunt plus error, the next batter then forced him at second base (so he made the first out but didn't hit into it), and then eight batters later, Washington ended the inning with the DP.
Mountain Home(r)
The Angels held a 5-2 lead over their unusual visitors, the Colorado Rockies, after the 6th inning on Monday thanks to homers by Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout. (We don't mean the Rockies themselves are unusual, just that their visit to Anaheim is. Don't @ us.) Jose Alvarez gives up a leadoff double to DJ LeMahieu in the 7th, soon it's 5-3, but as usual, we wouldn't be talking about this game if it had ended there. Justin Anderson walks Ian Desmond to start the 8th. Williams Jerez walks two more and manages to get a bases-loaded fly ball to Eric Young in left which isn't deep enough for Desmond to score. Enter Jim Johnson. Who also gets a bases-loaded fly ball to left. It's not only deep enough for Desmond to score, but David Dahl as well. And Chris Iannetta. And LeMahieu who hit it. It's the sixth go-ahead grand slam in the 8th inning or later in Rockies history, the prior one having been by Carlos Gonzalez against the Nationals on August 7, 2015. We touched on the unusual nature of Colorado's visit to Anaheim; it's also the first grand slam the Rockies have ever hit against them, home or away (there are eight teams left against whom they haven't hit one, and of course all are in the AL).
Turnabout is fair play, however. In the bottom of the 8th it's Eric Young's turn. After a single and three walks, it's 7-6 with two outs and the bases loaded, and of course-- well, no, he didn't hit a slam. But he did single to center, and with the runners going on the 3-2 pitch, we quickly flippped back to 8-7 Angels. Two more would score on a Trevor Story error to make the final 10-7, but Young's hit was the first of its kind for the Angels this entire season. There are only two teams left who haven't turned a deficit into a lead in the 8th inning or later, the Diamondbacks and Marlins.
Trout broke a tie with Vladimir Guerrero for third place on two Angels leaderboards with a 2-hit, 2-run, 2-RBI performance. In total number of those games, he now has 59 to Vlad's 58 (Tim Salmon 79, Garret Anderson 68). And if you add a home run to that list of qualifiers, Trout's done that 48 times to Vlad's 47 (Salmon 70, Anderson 51).
Minor-League Minute
In a week full of homers, we happened to be at Monday's "battle of the weird mascots" between the Hartford Yard Goats (it's an old-timey railroad term for the "tug" locomotive that moves other trains around the railyard) and the Binghamton Rumble Ponies (after the city's booming industry of making carousel horses). Anyway, the most memorable moment in the Binghamton/Hartford "rivalry" is still, and may always be, the time when Josh Fuentes was ruled to have struck out for mock-swinging at a pitch that slipped out of Corey Burns's hand. But Monday gave us another one in the form of Mets prospect Jhoan Ureña. After starter Frank Duncan hit the leadoff batter and walked two more, Ureña got the first hit of the game in the form of a 1st-inning grand slam. (There's eight more innings to play, but a "4-1-0" linescore has only happened once in the live-ball era.) Ureña then homers again in the 3rd, with a Budweiser billboard above the right-field seats standing between it and some windshields on the street outside. By the 6th Duncan is in trouble yet again after four straight hits, and even though he gets pulled, sidearmer Brian Moran faces Ureña with the bases loaded again. Stop us if you've heard this one. His third homer and second grand slam of the game, a team-record nine RBIs, and because Moran is a lefty, one slam from each side of the plate.
As we've said before, in over a million all-time minor-league games, pretty much everything has happened sometime, even if we can't really search for it. But there are only 13 major-leaguers who have hit two slams in a game, the most recent being Josh Willingham for the Nationals on July 27, 2009. Bill Mueller of the Red Sox (July 29, 2003) is the only one of those 13 to do it from both sides of the plate. And only four of the 13 added a third home run elsewhere in the game-- Mueller, fellow Bostonians Nomar Garciaparra (1999) and Jim Tabor (1939), and the very first with the two-grand-slams achievement, Tony Lazzeri of the Yankees on May 24, 1936.
Bottom Of The Bag
⚾ Ryan LaMarre, Wednesday: First White Sox batter with 3+ hits, 4+ RBI, and who drove in every run of a team victory, since Carlton Fisk against the Royals on August 31, 1987.
⚾ Alex Bregman & Tyler White, Monday: Second time in Astros history that the team had multiple 3- or 4-run homers in the 8th or later of the same game. Denis Menke & Jim Wynn did it in an 11-run 9th at Shea on July 30, 1969.
⚾ Anthony Rendon & Ryan Zimmerman, Tuesday: First time in Nationals history (2005) that the team had 6 or more hits with all of them by only two players. Expos did it twice (Ron LeFlore & Ellis Valentine, May 30 1980; Rusty Staub & John Tamargo, August 21, 1979).
⚾ Cubs, Sunday: First road game with three triples since July 28, 1990, in Montréal. First in Philadelphia since a 9-7 win at Shibe Park on May 6, 1951.
⚾ John Gant, Thursday: Combined with his homer on August 14 against the Nationals, became first Cardinals pitcher with two in a calendar month since Rick Wise in August 1973 (who actually had three!).
⚾ Austin Gomber, Friday: Second start in a row where he drove in two runs on offense without a home run. Last Cardinals pitcher to do that in consecutive games was Bob Tewksbury in 1993.
⚾ Cardinals, Saturday: First team held to two hits with one (or both) of them by a relief pitcher since the Astros' Rocky Childress singled against the Giants on June 24, 1988.
⚾ Dodgers, Wednesday: First team in live-ball era (very likely ever) to have three homers and at least one triple in a game, but no doubles or singles.
⚾ Whit Merrifield, Friday: First Royals leadoff batter to reach base four times, score three times, and steal a base in a home game since Johnny Damon against Tampa Bay on July 27, 2000.
⚾ Anthony Rizzo, Monday: Second game this year with a homer and two doubles (also May 9 vs Marlins). Only other player to have two such games at Wrigley Field in same season is Billy Williams in 1970.
⚾ Eduardo Rodriguez, Saturday: Second game of career (September 25, 2016, at Rays) where he struck out 12 batters yet didn't finish the 6th inning. First pitcher in live-ball era (any team) with two such outings.
⚾ Jason Kipnis, Thursday: First Clevelander with a homer, a double, and three RBIs batting 7th or lower since... Jason Kipnis last Sunday. First in team history to do it twice in five days (Jim Thome, 12 days in April 1996, had been previous mark).
⚾ Jacob Nix, Tuesday: Fourth pitcher in Padres history to throw 8+ innings, allow ≤ 1 run, but strike out zero. Previous was Mark Thurmond at Cincinnati on June 23, 1984.
⚾ Ronald Acuña, Sunday: Fourth game this year with three hits including a leadoff homer. Most in a single season in Braves history (1876). Also tied Braves record for total leadoff homers with seven (Marquis Grissom 1996).
⚾ Aramis Garcia, Friday: First Giants batter to have two hits including a homer in his MLB debut since John Bowker on April 12, 2008.
⚾ Ben Zobrist, Wednesday: Cubs' first walkoff anything against the Mets in the 11th or later since George Bell homered off Pete Schourek on August 11, 1991.
⚾ Juan Soto, Saturday: Youngest player to hit a single to turn a deficit into a lead in the 8th inning or later since Mel Ott walked off against the Cubs on July 20, 1927.
Did You Know?
In order to prove the note above about Christian Yelich being the first player with six hits and a cycle to not get a hit in the following game, we had to disprove the other players. That's easy for most of them since Retrosheet and Baseball Reference have all the boxscores online since 1907. But what about poor Sam Thompson in 1894? Well, that required a contemporary newspaper, such as the snippet below from one of our go-to's, The Sun of New York City, available on the Library of Congress website. This is that next game, against Cleveland on August 18, 1894 (morning paper of August 19).
Or you can just let us do it. :)
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