Baseball Stew: Odd and interesting home run notes

Ever since the era of the dead ball died and Babe Ruth brought home runs into the forefront of baseball with his dramatic power outbursts, the homer has become baseball fans’ favorite sight and favorite topic. Here’s a look at some interesting, odd, and noteworthy items about the longball.

Going into 2014 Adam Dunn had either walked, struck out, or hit a home run in 50% of his career plate appearances. Last season didn’t change things much at all. His total of K’s, bases on balls, and homers was 252 and he logged 511 plate appearances, meaning he almost kept up the 50% pace he had established in his previous 13 seasons.

Lifetime he cracked 462 home runs versus 2,379 strikeouts, making him the 35th most prolific home run hitter of all-time as well as the batter who sat down after striking out more times than anyone except Reggie Jackson and Jim Thome. It should be noted, though, that Jackson compiled his 2,597 strike outs over 21 seasons and Thome fanned 2,548 times in 22 seasons. If you add another season-and-a-fraction to Dunn’s career, he would easily eclipse the all-time record for whiffing.

On August 6, 2001, Boston’s Scott Hatteberg experienced a world of contrast in a single game. In a contest versus the Texas Rangers, he lined into a triple play in the fourth inning. One at bat later, in the sixth, he belted a grand slam, the second of his career, to make amends for the triple play and to put his Red Sox on top where they’d finish the game, 10-7 winners.

Coincidence: on May 2nd of 1954, Donora’s Stan the Man Musial enjoyed a most gratifying day at the plate— he homered five times during a double header.  The coincidence that a very young Nate Colbert, who would later match the feat as a member of the San Diego Padres, was in the stands that day has been widely chronicled.

However, another coincidence is the fact that on that same date, in 2002, another player, not known as a super slugger, also tied a home run record. Seattle’s Mike Cameron blasted four home runs and nearly hit a fifth (which would have set a new single contest home run record) as his Mariners pounded the Chicago White Sox, 15-4.

Cameron managed to hit his first four homers by the end of the fifth inning. Furthermore, he and Bret Boone became the first set of teammates to hit two home runs in the same inning. Remarkably, they went back-to-back two times in an explosive first.

Almost exactly four years later, on April 22, the Milwaukee Brewers became the first team in 40 seasons to drill five home runs in one inning. Almost needless to say, they breezed to a 11-0 win over the Cincinnati Reds. The only other teams to have accomplished this power surge were the 1939 New York Giants, the 1949 Philadelphia Phillies, and the 1961 San Francisco Giants.

On the same date the very next year, the Red Sox hit four consecutive, two-out, solo homers to tie a big league record. In the third inning, over a period of just 10 pitches, home runs flew off the bats of Manny Ramirez, J.D. Drew, Mike Lowell, and Jason Varitek. Their victim was Yankee pitcher Chase Wright who was making just his second major league start, and who worked his way out of the third inning before being lifted.

More from MLB History

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Wright, who had given up three earned runs over his five-inning start during his maiden outing, would make only one more appearance in his major league stint, working two innings and giving up one earned run, to finish his career with an ERA of 7.20, but, surprisingly, a record of 2-0 (he had a no decision in the debacle versus the Red Sox in a game Boston won, 7-6).

Finally, a puzzling managerial move that may have seemed illogical, but which somehow worked out. The date was May 15, 1953, and the Chicago White Sox were playing the Yankees. The ninth inning rolled around and the ChiSox loaded the bases as Vern Stephens’ prepared to bat. Stephens owned an impressive 10 career grand slams, but instead of getting the opportunity to shoot for number eleven, he was lifted for a pinch hitter.

But get this: the pinch hitter was Chicago pitcher, Tommy Byrne. White Sox manager Paul Richards was famous for employing different, often innovative strategies, but this seemed insane. Guess what? It worked. Byrne hit a grand slam. On the entire year he’d go 3-for-18 (.167) with just the one home run and only one run batted in besides the four which came on his slam. True, Byrne batted lefty, and he faced the whip-action pitching of sidearming right-hander Ewell Blackwell instead of the right-handed hitting Stephens, but still?! A seldom-used pitcher over an established slugger?

Tales such as these are typical reasons why fans love baseball and why fans, and not just chicks, love the longball.