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With two swings of the bat one week ago, Jim Thome elevated himself into the elite bracket of home run hitters.<\/p>\nWith two swings of the bat one week ago, Jim Thome elevated himself into the elite bracket of home run hitters.<\/p>\n
The Minnesota Twins\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 slugger had hit career home run number 598 back on 4 August against the Los Angeles Angels.\u00c2\u00a0 That marked the end of a ten-game road trip and Thome headed home hoping that he could get the two home runs needed to make it to the magical 600.<\/p>\n
The six home games passed without Thome adding to his total, as did two games at the Cleveland Indians: the club where he started his career and for whom he hit 334 longballs.<\/p>\n
And so he arrived at Comerica Park in Detroit on Monday 15 August.<\/p>\n
In the bottom of the sixth inning, he took a first pitch fastball from Rick Porcello over the left-centrefield fence to make it to 599.\u00c2\u00a0 He was back at the plate in the bottom of the seventh inning, focused on the game situation but also feeling an emotion that only seven other people have ever experienced.\u00c2\u00a0 One more good swing would bring up the round 600.\u00c2\u00a0 One long drive would put an exclamation point on years of hard work, dedication and sacrifices.\u00c2\u00a0 One moment that would\u00c2\u00a0become part of\u00c2\u00a0baseball history.<\/p>\n
Thome swung hard at a 2-1 curveball from Daniel Schlereth. He knew it was gone and he knew what that meant.\u00c2\u00a0 He had just become only the eighth person to hit 600 or more home runs in Major League baseball.<\/p>\n
While it is an exclusive club<\/a>, entry to it has been more frequent in recent years than at any other time in baseball history.\u00c2\u00a0 Alongside Thome, the 600 club includes one other active player (Alex Rodriguez) and three who have retired within the last five years (Ken Griffey Jr, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds).<\/p>\n Baseball as much as any sport has a storybook quality to it and the desire to cast its participants into groups of heroes and villains is strong.\u00c2\u00a0 Rodriguez, Sosa and Bonds will always have their achievements cast in a shadow of alleged \u00e2\u20ac\u201c or in Rodriguez\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s case admitted \u00e2\u20ac\u201c steroid usage.\u00c2\u00a0 In contrast, Griffey\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s 600th<\/sup> home run in June 2008 was greeted as a welcome antidote to the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dctainted\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 victories of others.\u00c2\u00a0 <\/p>\n Thome\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s triumph was met in a similar way to Griffey\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s.\u00c2\u00a0 There are 600 (now 601) stories of how he hit his home runs, but the eulogies that followed his historic blast revealed that there are many more tales about what he is like as a person that are all the more impressive.<\/p>\n We often place unreasonable expectations on sportsmen, putting them on a pedestal, knocking them down, landing them with the burden of being role models.\u00c2\u00a0 From a rational point of view, we shouldn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t be disappointed if a ballplayer doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t quite meet the \u00e2\u20ac\u02dchero\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 status that his on-the-field exploits inspire.<\/p>\n However, rational or not, the general consensus that Thome does live up to such high standards made seeing him reach the 600 milestone all the more special.<\/p>\n Looking back<\/strong><\/p>\n I was very grateful to receive some baseball season-preview magazines from the 1990s recently.\u00c2\u00a0 One of the many joys to be found in flicking through them is reading predictions about young players of the time with the benefit of hindsight.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n Thome made his Major League debut with the Indians in 1991 and the 1992 Sporting News Baseball Yearbook summed him up in the following way: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153In addition to his power potential, Thome makes consistent contact and has the kind of makeup that makes managers smile\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.<\/p>\n The 1994 Street and Smith\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Baseball, listed Thome in its Rookie Preview section. It was noted that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Thome is not officially a rookie\u00e2\u20ac\u009d, but that \u00e2\u20ac\u0153he did spend most of \u00e2\u20ac\u02dc93 in Triple-A, where he was the International League Player of the Year. The lefty-swinging Thome, 23, is ready to stick with the Indians after posting big numbers at Charlotte \u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 He is sound defensively\u00e2\u20ac\u009d.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n Thome gave up his third base glove many years ago, but the big numbers were only just beginning.<\/p>\n Triple plays<\/strong><\/p>\n The Cleveland Indians turned a triple play against the Chicago White Sox back on 3 April, but we hadn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t seen one since that point until last week when \u00e2\u20ac\u201c like buses \u00e2\u20ac\u201c two came along within a short space of time.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n The Milwaukee Brewers turned the sixth in franchise history on Monday with a 4-6-3-2 effort against the Los Angeles Dodgers.\u00c2\u00a0 Matt Kemp inadvertently played a major part in the feat as he tried to score while the ball was fielded by Prince Fielder for the second out.\u00c2\u00a0 The first baseman was alert to what was happening and catcher George Kottaras tagged Kemp out at the plate to complete the triple play.<\/p>\n Then on Tuesday, the Boston Red Sox turned a 5-4-3 triple play against the Tampa Bay Rays.\u00c2\u00a0 It was Boston\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s first triple-play in 17 years, although some of the sheen was knocked off by the Red Sox losing the game.<\/p>\n The Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) maintains a website<\/a> documenting all known triple plays in Major League history. \u00c2\u00a0You have to go back to 1974 for the last season that went by without at least one triple-play being recorded; however they are still a relatively rare event and always worth celebrating. So long as you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re not on the wrong end of it, of course.<\/p>\n