The most gut-wrenching near-home-run of Thursday night happened at Yankee Stadium when New York Yankees All-Star slugger Aaron Judge came within several feet of tying the American League single-season record of 61 homers set by club legend Roger Maris in 1961:
It appears the minor leagues weren’t about to be completely upstaged by the happenings in the Bronx.
As noted by Dylan Svoboda of the MLB website and Max Weisman of the New York Post, third baseman Delvin Pérez of the Memphis Redbirds, the Triple-A affiliate of the St. Louis Cardinals, thought he hit an absolute bomb to left field in the bottom of the sixth inning of a home game versus the Gwinnett Stripers, the Atlanta Braves’ affiliate. Pérez flipped his bat to begin his casual home-run trot that appeared rather silly when the wind kept the ball inside the park before it was caught by left fielder Justyn-Henry Malloy.
The problem was that Pérez apparently never picked his head up to view the completion of the play, as he continued his trip around the bases until teammates were able to inform him of the catch before he touched home plate:
“He thinks it’s gone!” one of the announcers exclaimed as those in the broadcast booth shared a laugh. “Oh nooooo!”
“When I got to home plate, the guys were saying, ‘That didn’t go out.’ And I started thinking, ‘I can’t believe it,'” Pérez said in Spanish about the moment after the game, according to Daniel Guerrero of STL Pinch Hits.
“People who know about this ballpark know that that ball was going out, but obviously the wind knocked it down,” he added during his comments. “I’ve batted a lot in this ballpark. From the moment I hit it, I heard the catcher say, ‘Oh my God,’ and I thought, ‘It’s gone.'”
It wasn’t gone, but Memphis nevertheless earned a 6-1 victory. That probably helped Pérez laugh at himself when all was said and done.
“In reality, I take that as just a funny moment in my career,” he remarked. “Those are things that happen. It wasn’t the first or the only one.”
For all the latest Sports News Click Here
