Monday, April 12, 2010

Trivia: Switch Hitter Homers

Former Yankee great Mickey Mantle has the most career home runs for a switch hitter with 536. Another Hall of Famer, Eddie Murray, is second with 504 homers. Can you name which current player is #3 on the all-time home run list for switch hitters?

9 comments:

Pauly said...

Chipper

Greg McConnell said...

You're correct, Pauly, but you're also disqualified because you live in Atlanta. ;-)

Chipper Jones is 3rd on the switch hitter homer list with 427. He also is the MLB all-time leader in strained obliques.

Chairman said...

I just had a very similar trivia question posed to me at the bar, whose answer was The Mick, Murray, Chipper, Jorge Posada, and Lance Berkman:

Name the 5 switch hitters that have hit 20+ HR 10 times.

Hint 1: 2 are in the HOF, and 2 are active.

Hint 2: The three that are active have been with the major league same team their entire career.

Pauly said...

I was amazed last nite I got half of this trivia question correct from the MLB Network: (I'm rewording it a little) Name the two hitters who have recorded the most strikeouts (11) over a three-game span.

It's a hard one. One player is from the mid-80's and the other is from the mid-2000's. (I nailed the one from the mid-2000's).

Good luck

Greg McConnell said...

I had forgotten that Posada and Berkman were switch hitters, so I wouldn't have gotten that one. But it's a good one.

Let's see, 11 K's in 3 games... hmm... honestly, I remember Sosa came off a dreadful year with the Cubs in '04, and then he went to the Orioles. If Sosa never got 11 K's in 3 games, then I'm sure at least once he got 10. I'll guess Sosa.

As for the mid-80s guy, I have no idea. Was Reggie Jackson or Dave Winfield still playing in the mid-80s? I'm thinking it might be a great slugger who was coming to the end of his career. I'll guess Dave Winfield.

Chairman said...

I'd hope that my guy Adam Dunn was involved, although 11 over 3 games seems a bit on the low side for the ML record.

Anything involving strikeouts makes me think Rob Deer, but he's late 80's, early 90's. Dave Kingman fits the profile for the mid-80's, I think.

Pauly said...

Your Answer was:

Jack Clark in the 80's and Preston Wilson in 2006.

As soon as they said "record for strikeouts" I immediately said good old Preston, a former Marlin.

Greg McConnell said...

Good question. I should have known that the mid-2000s guy was a Marlin!

BTW, Roland, I also thought 11 K's in 3 games sounded a little low for the MLB record. But on the other hand, a "golden sombrero" (4 Ks in a game) is still fairly rare. I guess when I think of it that way, it makes the numbers of 11 K's in 3 games sound more reasonable for the record.

Chairman said...

Greg - Perhaps. But if one of those games goes extra innings, and your guy gets 8 plate appearances, in one of those games...

Preston Wilson - there's another guy who I thought was going to be pretty good, but never learned to hit.

Jack Clark - liked that guy.