Anybody Can Walk Into One
This story was left in our comments by
@andrews2492, via YouTube
Some records get chased for decades. This one just sits there and waits for lightning.
September 16, 1924, Ebbets Field. Jim Bottomley went 6-for-6 with two home runs and drove in 12 runs in a 17-3 Cardinals win. The record he broke had stood since 1892 and belonged to Wilbert Robinson, who happened to be sitting in the other dugout that afternoon managing Brooklyn. Sixty-nine years passed before anyone touched the number again.
12
RBIs in one game — Jim Bottomley, September 16, 1924, and Mark Whiten, September 7, 1993
September 7, 1993, Riverfront Stadium. Mark Whiten had just misplayed a line drive that cost St. Louis the first game of a doubleheader, and he sat at his locker miserable about it. In the nightcap he hit a grand slam in the first, three-run homers in the sixth and the seventh, and a two-run shot off Rob Dibble in the ninth. Four home runs, 12 RBIs, 4-for-5.
Here is the part that stays with you. Bottomley was a Hall of Famer, a league MVP, a career .310 hitter. Whiten hit 105 home runs across eleven seasons and finished at .259. Four of those homers came on one September night in Cincinnati.
Baseball does not hand out its biggest days by reputation. Anybody can walk into one. That is a large part of why people keep showing up.
