Brewers Beat Cardinals on Back to Back Home Runs

There was a baseball first on April 3rd according to the Department of Odd Statistics. The St. Louis Cardinals opened their game at Milwaukee with their first two hitters, Dexter Fowler and Tommy Pham, belting home runs to lead off the game. Then with the Brewers batting in the In the bottom of the ninth inning trailing 4-3, Christian Yelich and Ryan Braun hit consecutive home runs off reliever Dominic Leone for a 5-4 Milwaukee victory. This was the first time in major league history that a game opened with the first two batters hitting home runs, and the last two batters hitting home runs.

The Brewers picked up Yelich from Miami and Lorenzo Cain from Kansas City in the off season, and its paying off in the early going. Through the first five games, Yelich has a homer and five RBIs, and is hitting .435 with an OPS oof 1.111. Cain is .409 with a home run four RBIs, three stolen bases, and a 1.14 OPS. Milwaukee is 4-1 on the young season.

In another odd first, San Francisco Giants second baseman Joe Panik became the first player to score a team’s first three runs of the season on solo home runs. Two of those won the Giants’ first two games of the season, both 1-0 victories over the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Giants lost this one to the Seattle Mariners 6-4. The Giants are 2-3 and scored only six runs through five games so they might want to get somebody other than Panik involved in the offense.

In New York, Giancarlo Stanton’s home debut with the Yankees did not go well. Stanton was 0-5 with five strikeouts and was booed. Didi Gregorius saved the day for the Yankees, hitting two home runs and driving in eight runs in New York’s 11-4 win over Tampa Bay.