Cincinnati Reds Scooter Gennett hits four home runs in single game
Get ready to memorize the name Scooter Gennett for your MLB pub trivia in 15 years. The Cincinnati Reds second baseman had a career evening on Tuesday, going 5-for-5 with four home runs and 10 RBI. Gennett is a five-year veteran who had three homers in 46 games before Tuesday (he raised his OPS 156 points and his wRC+ 39 points in just one game), so it's fair to say Tuesday night was (and will be) the most memorable night of his MLB career.
For reference, Tuesday night saw Cincinnati Reds second baseman Scooter Gennett hit twice as many homers as he did in the entire second half of his 2015 season (65 games). He drove in more runs in one home game than he had in his previous 25 home games this season. As Jeff Passan put it:
So who is this man? For many baseball fans, even close fans, Gennett's name is only vaguely familiar. He's been in the majors for five years, but he has toiled in relative obscurity in Milwaukee and then Cincinnati. He was drafted by the Brewers in the 16th round of the 2009 draft, and made his MLB debut on June 3, 2013.
His relative obscurity is not to say he hasn't been a solid hitter, however. Even before Tuesday's monster game (the type of game that can actually move a career slash line) Gennett had a .279/.317/.422 triple slash that was good for an OPS+ of 99 in 1,637 career plate appearances. None of his previous 502 games will stand in infamy like Tuesday game, though.
Gennett's four-homer game was just the 17th time in MLB history that a player has hit four home runs in a game, the most recent time before Gennett being Josh Hamilton for the Texas Rangers in 2012. Of the 17 four-homer games, only six other hitters tallied another hit besides the four long balls, and only one other hitter tallied double-digit RBI (Mark Whiten in 1993). No hitter has tallied five hits, four homers, and ten RBI in an MLB game – ever.
Whenever you can create a new type of box score, given the 141 (ish) years of baseball history, that's saying something. Also whenever you can embarrass the San Francisco Giants, that's a plus:
In all likelihood, this will be the greatest (baseball) moment of Gennett's career. And that's fine. We remember names like Philip Humber and Johnny Vander Meer thanks in large part to their one-game (or one-day) accomplishments. One day, Kerry Wood will be remembered for his 20 strikeouts and not much else. Baseball history is sprawling and ever-expanding, so the fact that Gennett was able to carve his name into that rich tapestry with arguably the best offensive night a hitter has ever had is amazing. The fact that we, as 2017 baseball fans, were lucky enough to have witnessed it – also amazing.
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