Sure, Barry Bonds has more career home runs than anyone else, but he is not even close to being the leader in late-inning home runs. Bonds hit 201 regular season homers after the sixth inning in his career, well behind Hank Aaron (236), Babe Ruth (233) and Willie Mays (215).
Indeed, although Bonds is the all-time career leader in homers hit in the third inning, and also the fourth inning, and he is tied with Ruth for the all-time lead in homers hit in the first inning, he is not the career leader in homers in any one inning after the fourth. I’ll look at the career leaders in homers for each inning, one by one, but first you need some exercise, so click on “Read the rest of this entry”
Most career regular season home runs in the first inning:
T1. Babe Ruth/Barry Bonds 133
3. Hank Aaron 124
Here is the answer to why no team would sign Barry to play in 2008 — it was a conspiracy to keep him from taking sole possession of the record for most first-inning homers. Barry’s failure to pass the Babe in this category will be widely cited as the reason for his failure to be elected to the Hall of Fame this winter.
The active leader in career first-inning homers is the similarly-widely-beloved Alex Rodriguez, who has hit 114 first-inning homers to date.
Most career regular season home runs in the second inning:
1. Fred McGriff 72
2. Jim Thome 69
3. Carlos Delgado 63
The greatest hitters tend to be placed high in the batting order with the hope (or, in the case of the first three slots in the order, the certainty) that they will come to the plate in the first inning. That means they don’t to tend to appear in the second inning. Babe Ruth had only 21 home runs in the second inning, and Hank Aaron only 36. So at the top of the second-inning list we get some unexpected names. Barry Bonds did come close to the top here, with 61 second-inning homers — tied with, surely you guessed it, Vinny Castilla.
Most career regular season home runs in the third inning:
1. Barry Bonds 102
2. Hank Aaron 98
3. Babe Ruth 94
A-Rod is the active leader with 81 third-inning homers.
Most career regular season home runs in the fourth inning:
1. Barry Bonds 100
2. Hank Aaaron 92
T3. Manny Ramirez and Jim Thome 90
Thome is on the disabled list, but still hopes to return by September to pick up his pursuit of sole possession of third place on the career fourth-inning home runs list.
Most career regular season home runs in the fifth inning:
1. Ken Griffey, Jr. 87
2. Barry Bonds 85
3. Babe Ruth 80
It’s good to see Junior at the top of one of these lists. He missed so much time late in his career, it’s already being forgotten by some how great a player he was. The active leader in fifth-inning homers is Albert Pujols with 66.
Most career regular season home runs in the sixth inning:
1. Hank Aaron 102
2. Alex Rodriguez 100
3. Babe Ruth 87
A-Rod, like Thome, is on the DL, and his chances of getting to 763 career homers continue to diminish. This will be the fifth year in a row in which his season oWAR has been lower than it was the previous season; a remarkably steady decline. But it seems inevitable that he he will take over the top spot on the sixth-inning home run list. Amaze (or worry) your friends and colleagues by keeping track of this stat and pointing out the moment that Alex passes Aaron.
Most career regular season home runs in the seventh inning:
1. Hank Aaron 99
2. Babe Ruth 87
3. Alex Rodriguez 68
Hammerin’ Hank dominates the seventh-inning homers list.
Most career regular season home runs in the eighth inning:
1. Willie Mays 91
T2. Babe Ruth/Barry Bonds/Hank Aaron 74
Willie Mays, who hadn’t made the top three on any of these lists so far, suddenly jumps to the top in a huge way come the eighth inning. Jim Thome is the active leader in eighth-inning homers with 67 (A-Rod has 65).
Most career regular season home runs in the ninth inning:
1. Babe Ruth 56
2. Barry Bonds 53
2. Hank Aaron 49
After all these years, the Babe remains the career leader in ninth-inning homers, and is likely to be so for many years yet. A-Rod is the active leader with just 40. There are fewer homers in the ninth mainly because many games don’t go a full nine innings, but also presumably because of the tendency in more recent decades to use a relief ace in the ninth.
Most career regular season home runs in extra innings:
1. Willie Mays 22
2. Jack Clark 18
T3. Babe Ruth and Frank Robinson 16
The extra-inning list was the subject of a post at the earlier incarnation of this blog (the poetically named “Baseball-Reference Blog”) by our old friend Raphy, who understandably emphasized the oddity of seeing Jack Clark at number two on this list (http://www.baseball-reference.com/blog/archives/9977). Clark was a fine player, but not really a guy who you would have anticipated seeing here. Albert Pujols is the active leader in extra-inning homers with 14, seemingly poised to move up on to this list. Let’s also add an extra salute to the awe-inspiring Willie Mays, the leader on both the eighth-inning and extra-inning lists.
