Readers’ Research – Walking Off Then Leading Off
Posted by Raphy on May 10, 2010
Here's a bit of a challenge for you.
I'm looking for players who have hit a walk off home run and then led off the next game with a homer. Bonus points if it happened in the 2 games of a double header. Extra bonus points for a player whose walk-off was at home and lead-off shot on the road.
Let's see what you have.
May 10th, 2010 at 12:25 pm
Haven't found anyone who did that yet, but Tim Raines did it over the course of the first week of May 1985... And those were his first 2 career round-trippers.
May 10th, 2010 at 1:09 pm
Close, but no cigar: Lou Brock lead off 4/16/67 with a HR, but his HR in the 8th inning on the 15th only padded a large lead... still, 4 HRs, 20 total bases in 2 games (and no SBs, I think!) - not bad.
May 10th, 2010 at 1:37 pm
Extra extra bonus points if it's both a double header AND the first one was at home and the second one was on the road... meaning it had to have been the rare home/road doubleheader?
May 10th, 2010 at 1:49 pm
Lou Whitaker, May 15th and 16th of 1987. They were both home games so it wasn't a true lead-off-the-game homer, but the HR logs still label HR's that lead off the bottom of the 1st as "Lead-Off".
May 10th, 2010 at 1:53 pm
I call those lead-off.
Rickey Henderson's lead-off home run record includes them.
DavidRF - looks like you got one.
(FWIW Retrosheet the PI event finder only consider at bats on the road as lead-off at bats.)
May 10th, 2010 at 3:53 pm
http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/TEX/TEX200907190.shtml
Walk-off and Lead-off in same game. i know it's not what you're looking for, but cool anyways.
May 10th, 2010 at 4:03 pm
book-end home runs. Cool indeed
May 10th, 2010 at 5:34 pm
Barry Bonds almost did it.
On May 6, 1973 he hit a 12th inning walk-off. May 7 was an off day and on May 8th bonds led off the bottom of the 1st with a HR against Bob Gibson.
However the giants had a doubleheader on the 6th and the walk-off was in Game 1 so there were not consecutive games.
May 10th, 2010 at 7:03 pm
Barry Bonds was about 8 years old in 1973. I think you mean Bobby Bonds.
May 10th, 2010 at 8:44 pm
Leadoff and walkoff in same game:
Vic Power, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/KC1/KC1195705070.shtml
Darrin Erstad, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/ANA/ANA200006250.shtml
Reed Johnson, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/TOR/TOR200306150.shtml
Ian Kinsler, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/TEX/TEX200907190.shtml
Answering the original question will take some more finagling.
May 10th, 2010 at 9:23 pm
Walkoff homer followed by leadoff homer in next game. In all cases, both games were at home. The link refers to the second game of the pair.
Dick McAuliffe, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/DET/DET196505210.shtml
Lou Whitaker, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/DET/DET198705160.shtml
Mariano Duncan, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CIN/CIN198908050.shtml
Roberto Kelly, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/NYA/NYA199008060.shtml
Jerome Walton, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/CIN/CIN199505070.shtml
Scott Hairston, http://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/SDN/SDN200708040.shtml
May 10th, 2010 at 10:22 pm
Gerry is obviously correct, I meant the Bonds with normal sized head.
thanks for backing me up Gerry.
May 10th, 2010 at 10:40 pm
Wow. Thanks SJBlonger. Are these complete lists?
May 11th, 2010 at 7:56 am
I used the Retrosheet data, 1952-2009, and I believe they are complete for that time frame, but always leave open the possibility that I messed something up...
May 11th, 2010 at 3:25 pm
There's a walk-off/lead-off pair by Joe Gordon on August 11 and 13, 1940.