Baseball returned to Fenway Park in Boston on Friday after the break for the MLB All-Star Game, but the night was not particularly a party for the more than 30,000 Red Sox fans present at the stadium, where they witnessed a massacre total visitors on duty: the Toronto Blue Jays.
The Canadian ninth scored an impressive total of 28 runs! to Boston pitching and broke his record for most goals scored in a game (24), implanted 42 years ago, on June 26, 1978. In addition, they were only two lines away from the absolute mark (30) of the Majors that the Texas Rangers imposed on August 22, 2007 against the Baltimore Orioles.
Boston, for its part, did not allow more than 25 touchdowns in a duel. almost a century ago. The last time something like this happened was on July 7, 1923, when they fell 27×3 against the Cleveland Indians.
One of the most outstanding in the Toronto offensive festival was the Cuban Lourdes Gurriel Jr., who hit six hits (double included), drove in five runs, scored three and raised his batting average to .318, seventh among all players in Big leagues.
In the century-old history of MLB, only 18 players had gone before in a game without strikeouts, six hits, five RBIs and three runs scored. The last time it happened was five years ago (Anthony Rendón) and in this century only six men had achieved it.
The youngest of the Gurriel brothers was an executioner for the Red Sox pitchers, who endured a grand total of 29 hits, including ten extra-base hits (five home runs and the same number of doubles).
Lourdes Jr., who had never hit more than four hits in a game, set a new personal best with six hits, which also represents a absolute record for Cubans in Major League history. To get an idea, only one player from the Island (José Cardenal) had gotten six hits in the same duel, but he did it in a match that lasted 14 innings on May 2, 1976.
As if that were not enough, Yunito also set his second best trailer mark (five) in a duel, only behind the seven he achieved on September 12, 2021 (vs. Baltimore). The Cuban seconded Raimel Tapia and Danny Jansen, who each drove in six runs in the enormous punishment of the Blue Jays against the Red Sox.
Gurriel, Tapia and Jansen became the fifth trident of the same team who gets five or more RBIs per capita in an MLB game during this century, and only the ninth in the history of American baseball.
By the way, highlighting Tapia at this point, who achieved a very strange feat in the Major Leagues: an infield home run with bases loaded. The event occurred in the third inning, when the Dominican found congested angles and hit a deep fly up the center of the field, which outfielder Jarren Duran could field, but he lost the location of the ball.
Tapia took advantage of the patrol car’s mistake, turned the frame and reached the rubber without any major complications. This was only the second major league infield grand slam this century. The other player to do so in the period since 2001 was Michael Taylor (Washington Nationals), on September 8, 2017 against Philadelphia.
In MLB history, there have been 75 grand slams in the field. The first reported one occurred on July 29, 1915, starring Honus Wagner (Pittsburgh Pirates) against the Brooklyn Robins. A total of 72 batters add up to at least one grand slam inside the park and three men achieved it twice: Kiki Cuyler (1925 and 1929), John Stone (1932 and 1938) and Ferris Fain (1947 and 1954).
