In 1982, Expos teammates Andre Dawson and Al Oliver each finished the year with 67 extra-base hits. The spotlight hasn’t been swiveled in their direction for any pure, numerical reason, but for where that number stood in relation to all the other extra-base hit figures produced by the NL’s batsmen: at the very top, unmatched and unsurpassed by any other. And so, for the very first time in its long history, the National League saw teammates share the crown in this particular category. Two years later, Red Sox Dwight Evans and Tony Armas finished in a dead heat at the very top of the AL – 77 extra-base hits for each – and the Junior Circuit had its first co-champs. Since then, the Phillies’ Von Hayes and Mike Schmidt (1986) and the Brewers’ Ryan Braun and Aramis Ramírez (2012) have joined their forebears in this specified twice-as-nice paradigm.
Heading into the final weekend of the first half of the 2025 season, the NL’s Top of the Pops, Extra-Base Hits version, shows a trio of players: defending NL MVP Shohei Ohtani repping for the Dodgers and, wouldn’t you know it, a pair of Cubs – Seiya Suzuki and 23-year-old, do-it-all Pete Crow-Armstrong.
Pete Crow-Armstrong homered twice to go along with a double in the Cubs’ 8-1 win over the Twins.
~The 23-year-old has five multi-homer games this year. Those five are the most for a Cub in a season since Derrek Lee had eight in 2005. The five also tie for the fourth most for a Cub at this specific point in a season (93 games). Hack Wilson had six at this stage in 1929, a level later reached by Sammy Sosa in 1998 and Lee in 2005. Sosa also had five in 2001.
~The Cubs’ center fielder carries quite a power/speed profile into the All-Star break, with 27 stolen bases (second in the NL) to pair with his co-leading 50 extra-base hits. In the All-Star Era, Crow-Armstrong and Bobby Bonds (1973) are the only two players to make it to the break with at least 27 and 50 (Bonds had 28 and 50).
~The effort pushed Crow-Armstrong’s longball tally to 25 – tied for fourth in the NL. He’s the 21st player to be in an age-23 or younger season and make it to the break with at least 25 home runs. The Orioles’ Gunnar Henderson – with 28 last year – had been the last to do this. The top-five tallies for this collection of 21:
37 Reggie Jackson in 1969
33 Mark McGwire in 1987
31 Willie Mays in 1954
30 Cody Bellinger in 2019
29 Prince Fielder in 2007
On the topic of Gunnar Henderson, he delivered a pinch-hit, go-ahead two-run home run in the eighth inning to give the Orioles a 2-1 lead in the first game of a doubleheader. The circumstances and outcomes of the moment have occurred 10 times for an Oriole in the Divisional Era.
1969-2025: Go-Ahead, Pinch-Hit HR With the Orioles Trailing, 8th Inning or Later
Curt Motton on August 6, 1969
Brooks Robinson on April 19, 1977
Pat Kelly on July 23, 1979
Jim Dwyer on September 6, 1987
Larry Sheets on August 24, 1988
Phil Bradley on July 13, 1990
Derrick May on September 19, 1999
Chris Davis on June 23, 2014
Hyun Soo Kim on September 28, 2016
Gunnar Henderson on July 10, 2025
~In the second game of the doubleheader, Henderson went 3-for-5 with a double to lead the Orioles to a 7-3 win and sweep of the double dip against the Mets. Now playing in his age-24 campaign, Henderson has 185 extra-base hits in his career; there are six Browns/Orioles who had at least 200 through their age-24 seasons: Manny Machado (323), Cal Ripken, Jr. (275), Eddie Murray (247), Harlond Clift (238), Boog Powell (226) and Vern Stephens (205). Like Henderson, Ripken and Stephens had at least three-quarters of their playing time at shortstop.
Reds shortstop Elly De La Cruz got halfway to 200 hits in his club’s 6-0 win on Thursday, going 2-for-4 with his 23rd steal of the year. There have been nearly 1,300 players in the All-Star Era to get to the break with at least 100 hits; 117 of them have brought at least 23 stolen bases to the mix as well. Lou Brock’s 1974 campaign is this collection’s clubhouse leader when it comes to thefts, with 60 to go along with 111 hits. Reds to be at the century mark in hits and ahead of De La Cruz in steals: Bobby Tolan in 1972, Joe Morgan in 1974 and Deion Sanders in 1997.
In the Yankees’ come-from-behind, extra-inning win on Thursday, Giancarlo Stanton hit his 432nd career homer (most among active players) – a pinch-hit, two-run shot in the eighth. This was Stanton’s first-ever pinch-hit home run, thus taking him out of consideration for the most career longballs in the Divisional Era without any as a pinch-hitter.
1969-2025: 400+ Career HR, Zero as a Pinch-Hitter
511 Miguel Cabrera
462 José Canseco
449 Vladimir Guerrero
431 Cal Ripken, Jr.
409 Mark Teixeira
Helping Boston to its seventh straight victory, Ceddanne Rafaela drove in two runs. The center fielder has driven in a run in each of his last six games and in 2025, has seven multi-RBI efforts when batting ninth (as he was for this game)*. This latter lens – multi-RBI games when batting ninth – shows Rafaela with 17 of them in 2024, the most ever in a season for a member of the Red Sox, ahead of Jason Varitek’s 15 in 2003. For a Red Sox career, Rafaela’s 24 are overshadowed by two figures –Jackie Bradley, Jr.’s 42 and Butch Hobson’s 27.
*Rafaela is tied with Detroit’s Javier Báez for the most multi-RBI lines out of the ninth spot for the 2025 season.
Aroldis Chapman fanned two in a scoreless ninth for his 1,300th and 1,301st strikeouts. The left-hander is the first pitcher with zero career starts to get to this milestone, with Chapman ahead of his two fellow 2010 debut-ers: Craig Kimbrel (1,266 K’s) and Kenley Jansen (1,256).
In an Athletics’ 5-4 win (ended by a Tyler Soderstrom single in the bottom of the 11th), Soderstrom hit his 16th homer and Nick Kurtz added his 15th. This pair joins an A’s duo from almost 40 years ago as the only Athletics teammates to both be in age-23 or younger seasons and enter an All-Star break with at least 15 longballs.
1987 Mark McGwire (33) and José Canseco (18)
2025 Tyler Soderstrom (16) and Nick Kurtz (15)
Thanks to Baseball Reference and its extraordinary research database, Stathead, for help in assembling this piece.
Roger Schlueter
As Sr. Editorial Director for Major League Baseball Productions from 2004-2015, Roger served as a hub for hundreds of hours of films, series, documentaries and features: as researcher, fact-checker, script doctor, and developer of ideas. The years at MLB Production gave him the ideal platform to pursue what galvanized him the most – the idea that so much of what takes place on the field during the MLB regular and postseason (and is forever beautifully condensed into a box score) has connections to what has come before. Unearthing and celebrating these webs allows baseball to thrive, for the present can come alive and also reignite the past.