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ESPN.com: Baseball

Wednesday, May 29, 2002
Updated: May 31, 12:16 PM ET
Useless information department

By Jayson Stark
ESPN.com

It's still hard to believe that after a nine-year wait for someone, anyone to hit four home runs in one game, the wait for the next guy to do it lasted only 21 days. But that's all the time that elapsed between Mike Cameron's four-homer game and Shawn Green's four-homer game last Thursday.

A few weeks ago, we looked up all the stuff that had happened in the world in between Mark Whiten's four-homer game and Cameron's. So let's revive much of that same breakdown and compare it to the gap between Cameron and Green:


	Green

Cameron
Cameron

According to the Sultan of Swat Stats, SABR'S David Vincent, there were 39,256 homers hit in the big leagues in between the last set of four-homer games. This time, there were 463 hit between four-homer games.

Between Whiten and Cameron, assorted players ranging from Tom Prince to Barry Bonds combined for 2,400 multihomer games. Between Cameron and Green, assorted players ranging from Tony Graffanino to Barry Bonds combined for 32 multihomer games.

Betweem Whiten's game and Cameron's game, there were 100 three-homer games. Between Cameron's game and Green's game, there was one three-homer game (by Erubiel Durazo, who wasn't even off the disabled list when Cameron hit his four homers)

There were 17 no-hitters (including Derek Lowe's this year) between Whiten and Cameron. No one even took one into the ninth in between Cameron and Green.

Randy Johnson struck out 2,401 hitters between Whiten's game and Cameron's. He struck out 34 in between Cameron's game and Green's.

Sammy Sosa hit 394 home runs between the last set of four-homer games. He hit five in between this set of four-homer games.

Rickey Henderson led off 17 games with home runs between Whiten's four-homer game and Cameron's four-homer game (including one in Derek Lowe's no-hitter, five days before Cameron's four-peat). Rickey led off no games with a home run between Cameron's four-homer game and Green's four-homer game -- and, in fact, hit no home runs, period.

And the Dow Jones Industrial Average went up 6,484 points (from 3607 to 10091) between Whiten and Cameron. It went up 67 points (from 10091 to 10158) between Cameron and Green.

In other Shawn Green trivia ...

Just to make things more dramatic, Green hit home run No. 4 with two outs in the ninth inning. He was only the second four-homer man to do that. The other, according to David Vincent, was Bob Horner, on July 6, 1986.

Green also did this the hard way by not homering in his first at-bat. And that, too, had been done by only three previous four-homer men, according to David Vincent.

Schmidt didn't hit his first until the fifth inning (in his third at-bat). Pat Seerey didn't hit his first homer until the fourth inning (second at-bat). And Colavito also hit his first homer in his second trip (after walking in his first).

Green's eruption with two outs in the ninth was part of something else that had never happened before: The Dodgers became the first team ever to hit back-to-back-to-back homers with two outs in the ninth.

According to David Vincent, seven teams had hit back-to-back-to-backers with nobody out in the ninth. And five had done it with one out in the ninth. But no one had ever waited until there was one out to go.

You sure wouldn't have thought that the team to do it would be a Dodgers team that had had one game in its previous 30 in which it had homered three times before it stepped off the plane in Milwaukee.

Going into their series in Milwaukee, the Dodgers hadn't had a four-homer game all season as a team. They then hit four in the first game of the series and eight (four by Green, four by non-Shawn Greens) in the third game of the series.

Those four homers gave Green six home runs just in that three-game series in Milwaukee. The Pirates' whole team hasn't hit six homers in any three-game series all year. (They did hit seven in a four-game series at Wrigley Field last week, but that doesn't count.)

We want to put those 19 total bases Green ran up in this game in perspective. All of these players don't have 19 total bases all season: Ben Davis, Pedro Feliz, Shawon Dunston, Orlando Merced, Tim Raines, Todd Hundley, Andres Galarraga, Matt Stairs or these members of the all-injured team -- Junior Griffey, Edgar Martinez and Pudge Rodriguez.

And let's remember one more thing: Five extra-base hits in a game is even more rare than four homers in a game. Green was just the fifth man since 1900 to do that. The others: Lou Boudreau (July 14, 1946) Joe Adcock (in his 1954 four-homer game), Willie Stargell (Aug. 1, 1970) and Steve Garvey (Aug. 28, 1977).

Greeen hit his 200th career homer in the middle of his four-homer game. And that, too, is a first. No player had ever reached a 100, 200, 300, 400 or 500-homer milestone in the middle of a four-homer game before, according to Vincent. The three previous closest calls:

Horner (just missed No. 200 -- hitting Nos. 202 through 205).
Rocky Colavito (just missed No. 100 -- hitting Nos. 102 through 105).
Mike Schmidt (missed No. 100 on the other side -- hitting Nos. 95 through 98).

Three years ago, Green had a 28-game hitting streak. Now he's had a four-homer game. No other player since 1900 has had that many home runs in a game and that long a hitting streak during his career.

Chuck Klein came closest, with a couple of 26-game hitting streaks. Willie Mays' longest streak was 21 games. Joe Adcock and Horner had 20-gamers.

Before 1900, Ed Delahanty hit four homers in 1896 and had a 31-game streak in 1899.

Not only was this the first season featuring two four-homer games. It's only the fourth decade to feature more than one four-homer game.

Lee Sinins, of baseball-encyclopedia.com, reports that the last decade that could make that claim (assuming decades know how to make claims) was the 1950s. There were three in the '50s (Adcock, Rocky Colavito, Gil Hodges), two in the 1930s (Klein, Lou Gehrig) and two in the 1890s (Delahanty, Bobby Lowe).

We've heard of lake-effect snow -- but lake-effect four-homer games? Of the 14 times a batter has hit four home runs in one game, five have now come in either Milwaukee or Chicago, in five different parks. The five parks and the president of their four-homer fan club, courtesy of David Vincent;

Ed Delahanty 7/13/1896 West Side Grounds, Chicago
Willie Mays 4/30/1961 County Stadium, Milwaukee
Mike Schmidt 4/17/1976 Wrigley Field, Chicago
Mike Cameron 5/2/2002 Comiskey Park II, Chicago
Shawn Green 5/23/2002 Miller Park, Milwaukee

And two other cities hosted more than one four-homer game. Lou Gehrig and Pat Seerey both displayed four-sight in Philadelphia's Shibe Park. And Gil Hodges and Joe Adcock were first and four-most at Ebbetts Field in Brooklyn.

Before Green came along, it was unprecedented for any player to have four homers and six hits in a game. But it also was close to unprecedented for anybody to do it in a whole career. The only other three men to do it, courtesy of Lee Sinins:

Ed Delahanty (all before 1900), Rocky Colavito (four homers in 1959, six hits in 1962) and Bobby Lowe (all before 1900).

Finally, Green was the first player in history to have a four-homer game in a domed stadium -- or was he? The roof of Miller Park was open. So we'll await a ruling from you dome phanatics on that one.

Triviality
Now that Mark McGwire has retired, Shawn Green is one of only three active players who have hit 40 homers or more in a season in each league. Can you name the other two? (Answer at bottom.)

In other useless information ...

It's the time of the year to start looking at historic paces. And while Angels pitcher Ramon Ortiz has made great strides in his quest to be a true Little Pedro, he also is working on being Little Bert. In case you hadn't noticed, Ortiz is hanging right in there with Bert Blyleven on a historic gopherball pace.

Heading into his start Wednesday, Ortiz had given up seven homers in his last two starts and was up to 16 after his start of last Friday (May 24). During his fabled March to 50 Gopherballs in 1986, Blyleven allowed No. 16 on May 23. Then, alas, he gave up No. 17 four innings later. So he was one ahead of Ortiz's pace. But it's still worth watching this race for further historic developments.

By the way, Big Pedro (Martinez) has given up more than 17 homers in only one of the last six seasons.

Mark Quinn just set one of basball's most prestigious home run records -- most homers in history by a guy whose name starts with the letter Q (44). So what other active players are threats to set that record for their letters?

Well, Todd Zeile (223) has closed to within 14 of the Z leader, Gus Zernial. Junior Griffey (461) is within 32 of the G leader, Lou Gehrig. And Barry Bonds, Rafael Palmeiro, Frank Thomas and Greg Vaughn already lead their letter. As did Jose Canseco upon his high-octane retirement.

The best measure of why Mark Prior deserves to be called a Phenom with a capital P might be the respect he'd earned with his arm and his bat before ever reaching the big leagues.


	Prior

As the Detroit Free Press' John Lowe points out, in Prior's very first start in the big leagues, Don Baylor had the No. 8 hitter, Augie Ojeda, bunt a runner from second to third in the fourth inning -- to allow Prior to bat with a man on third and one out. Sorry to report Prior stranded the runner with a ground ball to second.

But it isn't unprecedented for managers (well, some managers) to have their No. 8 hitters bunt in front of a pitcher who can hit. Tony La Russa did that with Mike Matheny to bring up Woody Williams last Sept. 20, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. Williams also grounded out.

Speaking of dazzling young Cubs pitchers, we wouldn't want to forget Kerry Wood. He's working on a streak of unhittability even Pedro Martinez has never matched -- five straight starts of six innings or more in which he has given up four hits or fewer.

No one has made it to six straight, according to Elias' Kevin Hines, since Mark Langston in 1988 (Aug. 29-Sept. 24). And in the last 10 seasons, only four pitchers have done it in five straight -- but one of them was just this season:

Hideo Nomo, April 9-May 1, 2002
Woody Williams, Aug. 31-Sept. 30, 2001
Randy Johnson, May 28-June 19, 1997
Randy Johnson, Sea. 05/28/1997 06/19/1997
Al Leiter, May 11-June 1, 1996

One thing we know about Cardinals rookie Jason Simontacchi: When he was pitching for that Italian Olympic team, he didn't come across any Giles brothers. But over here in the States, we have two Giles brothers -- and Simontacchi now has served up home runs to both of them.

Marcus got him May 4. Brian homered off him last Friday. In 26 1/3 innings, Simontacchi has given up one home run to people not named Giles (to Aramis Ramirez).

We're still ruminating over that amazing 13-12 game the Twins and Yankees played two weekends ago at Yankee Stadium, the game won on Jason Giambi's walkoff slam in the 14th inning. An overlooked feature of that tussle was that both teams got 20 hits that night. And you don't see that much.

According to Elias, it was only the second game in which each team got 20 hits or more in the last 18 years. Last time that happened was a game six years earlier to the day -- Orioles 14, Mariners 13, in which those two clubs got 21 hits apiece in nine innings.

Before that, you have to go back to the fabled 25-inning game between the Brewers and White Sox on May 8 and 9, 1984. The White Sox had 23 hits in that game, the Brewers 20.

And if you want to delve beyond that, there was a 20-inning game between the Red Sox and Mariners on Sept. 3, 1981; a 20-11 nine-inning game between the Twins and A's on April 27, 1980, and two games in 1979 -- including the Cubs' and Phillies' legendary 23-22, 10-inning game at Wrigley Field. By the way, that game was also played on May 17, a day on which the whole sport apparently has 20-20 vision.

Ever heard of a team going a month without using a pinch-hitter? The Tigers almost did it.

Booth Newspapers' Danny Knobler reports that on Tuesday, manager Luis Pujols used his first pinch-hitter in the entire month of May. And the previous time he'd pinch-hit, on April 30, it was because of an injury. So he'd gone 35 games (since April 18) without running a pinch-hitter up there merely for the sake of strategy. Somewhere, Cito Gaston was enjoying that.

Next Monday, the Tigers will finally face Pedro Martinez again -- for the first time since April 20, 1999. According to Danny Knobler, Martinez has faced the Yankees 14 times since his last start against the Tigers, has made 83 starts altogether and has won 52 games against everybody else.


	Garciaparra

Reader Allan Wood, who is spending the season chronicling long at-bats, reports that we have a new leader in the Longest At-Bat of the Year competition. Nomar Garciaparra dueled David Wells for 14 pitches last Saturday -- without ever getting to ball three. Garciaparra finally struck out on a 2-2 pitch (after nine foul balls).

The East Valley Tribune's Ed Price reports that, heading into Curt Schilling's start Wednesday in San Francisco, Schilling was on a pace to strike out 363 hitters if he makes 35 starts -- while walking only 25. (Yep, 25).

That would break Sandy Koufax's modern record for strikeout-walk differential (311 -- 382 K, 71 BB, in 1965). And it would be by far the lowest walk total for a pitcher who whiffed 300 in a season.

Here, thanks to Lee Sinins' sensational sabermetric baseball encyclopedia, are the fewest walks since 1900 in a 300-strikeout season:

Pitcher	Year	BB	SO
Pedro Martinez	1999	37	313
Curt Schilling	1997	58	319
Sandy Koufax	1963	58	306
Curt Schilling	1998	61	300
Pedro Martinez	1997	67	305
Randy Johnson	1999	70	364
Randy Johnson	2001	71	372
Sandy Koufax	1965	71	382
Mike Scott	1986	72	306
Randy Johnson	2000	76	347
Walter Johnson	1912	76	303
Walter Johnson	1910	76	313

Loyal reader David Hallstrom, our vice president in charge of bobbleheads, reports that the only two position players to play on their bobblehead days last week -- Eric Chavez and Richie Sexson -- each went 2 for 4. So our continuing proof of the power of the bobblehead is that this year's bobblehead men are hitting .450 (9 for 20) on their bobblehead days, with a .500 on-base percentage and .800 slugging percentage. Astounding.

In our weekly report from the Farms Bureau, the Double-A Wichita Wranglers, of the always-entertaining Texas League, put together the inning of the year last Thursday, according to our friends from SportsTicker.

In the inning, they scored 14 runs, got 13 hits and had two hits in the inning from five of the nine men in the lineup. But most amazing of all, 16 straight hitters reached base and 14 straight hitters scored. Hard to do, folks.

And it took some doing for Wichita to win that Inning of the Year award, too, since the Portland Beavers had one May 16 that's almost impossible. On May 16, they were trailing Las Vegas by six runs with two outs and no one on in the ninth -- then scored eight runs to win, 12-10.

And let's award some frequent-traveler points to those Bowie Bay Sox, who had lost 22 straight games on the road this year (28 in a row dating back to last year) before they finally beat New Haven last Saturday, 9-4.

Those 22 straight road losses tie the all-time professional record, set by the 1943 Philadelphia Athletics. Before those Bay Sox finally won in New Haven, they had been outscored on the road, 145-52.

The Sultan's Corner

Marquis Grissom did something last weekend that no player had ever done -- homer off Randy Johnson in back-to-back innings. In fact -- according to the Sultan of Swat Stats, David Vincent -- only four other players had ever even homered off the Unit in consecutive at-bats in the same game.

Here's the complete list of previous players with multihomer games against Johnson, courtesy of the Sultan:

Batter	Date	Innings
Glenn Wilson	9/15/1988	(2nd, 4th)*
Jesse Barfield	4/26/1990	(2nd, 7th)
Dave Henderson	9/26/1993	(2nd, 7th)
Gerald Williams	7/16/1994	(2nd, 7th)
John Valentin	4/11/1997	(4th, 6th)*
Jim Edmonds	9/23/1997	(1st, 6th)
Greg Norton	5/14/1998	(3rd, 6th)
Juan Gonzalez	7/5/1998	(1st, 7th)
Javy Lopez	6/20/1999	(3rd, 5th)*
Kevin Young	8/21/1999	(2nd, 4th)*
Chipper Jones	9/05/1999	(1st, 6th)
Chipper Jones	9/05/2000	(1st, 5th)

(* consecutive at-bats)

With Barry Bonds about to pass Frank Robinson and move into fourth-place on the all-time homer list, the Sultan reports that Robinson has been No. 4 for almost 30 years. He passed Harmon Killebrew on Aug. 17, 1973 -- which was also the day Willie Mays hit the final home run of his career.

Here is what the list of all-time home run leaders looked like back on Aug. 17, 1973, once Robinson and Mays had finished rounding the bases:

1. Babe Ruth 714
2. Hank Aaron 703
3. Willie Mays 660
4. Frank Robinson 545
5. Harmon Killebrew 544
6. Mickey Mantle 536
7. Jimmie Foxx 534
8. Ted Williams 521
9. Ernie Banks 512
10. Eddie Mathews 512
11. Mel Ott 511

And when Bonds hits his 586th homer, he'll be the first man to hit a home run with that high a number next to it since July 6, 1976, the day of Robinson's final homer (off Sid Monge).

Finally, we can't resist one more Shawn Green note: This guy just hit 10 homers in a week -- tying a record by Frank Howard that had stood for more than three decades. Here are the all-time leaders in most home runs in a seven-day period, courtesy of the Sultan:

HRs	Batter	Date of first HR
10	Frank Howard	5/12/1968
9	Albert Belle	7/9/1998
9	Barry Bonds	5/17/2001 (and 5/18/2001)
9	Hank Greenberg	7/24/1938
9	Babe Ruth	5/18/1930
9	Sammy Sosa	6/15/1998

Trivia Answer
Junior Griffey and David Justice.

Jayson Stark is a senior writer for ESPN.com.