Hitting 5 homers in a loss
Posted by Andy on May 5, 2009
On my cell phone, I very often visit the mobile version of ESPN.com. Recently, they added a box with a sports fact, such as one pointing out that the Utah Jazz of the NBA went 1-21 this season on the road against teams with a winning record. One fact that they've been showing lately is that the Nationals are the 3rd team this year to lose a game in which they hit 5 homers. That's a simple task to look up on the PI, and here are the results:
Cnt Date Tm Opp GmReslt PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB IBB SO HBP SH SF ROE GDP SB CS LOB Batrs +----+-------------+---+----+-------+---+---+--+--+--+--+--+---+--+---+--+---+--+--+---+---+--+--+---+-----+ 1 2009-04-27 WSN @PHI L 11-13 49 38 11 12 2 0 5 11 10 1 7 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 11 17 2 2009-04-09 CLE @TEX L 8-12 44 37 8 11 2 0 5 8 5 0 10 2 0 0 0 1 1 0 9 9 3 2009-04-08 HOU CHC L 6-11 38 38 6 11 3 0 5 6 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5 16 4 2008-09-18 TBR MIN L 8-11 40 36 8 9 2 0 5 8 3 0 3 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 5 10 5 2008-07-30 CLE DET L 12-14 65 54 12 19 5 0 5 10 11 2 15 0 0 0 0 3 0 0 14 12 6 2007-08-28 BAL TBD L 8-15 40 39 8 13 0 1 6 8 1 0 7 0 0 0 0 0 2 1 5 9 7 2007-08-04 PIT CIN L 8-9 47 40 8 12 1 0 5 8 6 1 7 1 0 0 0 2 1 0 9 17 8 2007-06-17 MIL @MIN L 9-10 46 41 9 15 2 0 5 9 4 0 10 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 10 11 9 2007-06-15 PHI DET L 8-12 43 39 8 13 2 1 5 8 4 0 7 0 0 0 0 0 2 0 8 15 10 2007-05-27 CIN PIT L 10-14 43 41 10 15 1 0 5 9 0 0 4 1 1 0 2 2 0 0 6 16 11 2006-06-13 PHI NYM L 7-9 42 37 7 13 2 0 5 7 5 0 6 0 0 0 0 2 0 1 8 15 12 2005-08-02 MIL @NYM L 8-9 53 47 8 17 1 0 5 8 3 0 14 2 1 0 0 1 2 1 12 17 13 2005-04-04 SDP @COL L 10-12 47 38 10 12 1 0 5 10 8 0 10 0 0 1 1 1 2 0 10 17
The full list is here. You'll note that before The Steroids Era, this was a pretty rare event, happening just 11 times in the 11 seasons before 1992. Now it happens 2-3 times per season on average.
May 5th, 2009 at 8:25 am
You should think about maybe posting step by step instructions on how you are able to get these stat results so that people can learn how to better use your site.
May 5th, 2009 at 4:20 pm
Ascrit - It might get pretty tedious if every post included instructions. However, if you ever have a question about how to do something all you have to do is ask.
Go to the "Team Batting Game Finder", set HR>=5, Under Team select "L", and sort by "Date of Game"
May 5th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
hardly any surprise here that 3 of these games happened in philadelphia and citizens bank park
May 5th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
Updated the post to include the missing link to the full list. Thanks Raphy.
May 5th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
Some of these games deserve special mention. Twice (in the Retrosheet era) a team hit 7 homers and lost, and both times it was the Tigers, losing to some Sox; 8 August 2004, 11-9 to Boston, and 28 May 1995, 14-12 to the White Sox.
Several of these losing teams scored only 5 runs off their 5 homers, but only one of them was held to 6 runs on 6 homers; Oakland's 8-6 loss to Minnesota on 3 August 1991.
May 6th, 2009 at 8:38 am
Thanks Raphy!