Players who hit home runs in their first at-bat - Part 3
Major League Baseball is considered America’s National pastime and the quality of the game confirms this reward. The game is popular for sky-high hits, smashing drives and bone breaking pitching but there is one thing that surpass the all other and that
is a home-run. The value of home-run increases two folds when it is launched by a rookie on his first ever at-bat.
Many players has achieved this mark including Hall of Fame hitter Earl Averill, who was the first of the only two Hall of the Fame batters, who launched home-runs on their first at-bat. The article is one part of a series written to cover all players who
have achieved this mark.
7. Clise Dudley
Although hitting is more associated with batters than pitchers, there are few who have dominated in their first game with the bat instead of ball. Clise Dudley is one of those pitchers who amazed the spectators with his bat in his maiden outing.
Dudley playing his debut game on April 18, 1929 for the Brooklyn Robins made a dazzling home-run on the very first pitch he faced to enter the National League’s Brooklyn Dodgers name in the list. He was the second pitcher to accomplish this mark after Bill
Duggleby. Besides being a pitcher and crushing the batters with his fastballs, Dudley launched 9 home-runs that year in 35 games.
He served Dodgers for two years in which he played total of 56 games and launched 12 home-runs. Talking specifically of his pitching quality, one might easily consider him an all-rounder. He has made 51 strike-outs in 27 starts over two years with the Dodgers.
He moved to Philadelphia Phillies at the age of 27 on 1931 and in his two years stay he started 24 games, all in 1931 and made 50 strike-outs with an 8-14 record. He also launched 10 home-runs in 1931 and three in 1932. He played his career ending game with
Pittsburgh Pirates on September 10, 1933.
In the span of five years, he played exactly 100 games and hammered 25 home-runs and made 106 strike-outs in 51 starts having a record of 17-33 with a 5.03 ERA.
8. Gordon Slade
Just a year after Dudley entered the Brooklyn Dodgers name in the list, another player came from the soil of Utah and made another entry for the club. Slade a Salt Lake City native landed into Major League Baseball on April 21, 1930 for the first time and
launched a huge home-run in his first at-bat.
Slade spent five years in the Major League, three seasons with Brooklyn Dodgers, one with St. Louis Cardinals and last two with Cincinnati Reds. With Brooklyn, in his 559 at-bats at shortstop position, he made only three home-runs and scored 58 runs with
54 RBIs with a .238 batting averages.
Looking at his record one might say that Slade made a brilliant start but sunk down immediately. He played 39 outings with the Cardinals in 1933 but made only seven hits and six runs in 62 at-bats. However, when he moved to the Reds, a considerable change
was noted in his game, as he scored 61 runs, just three less than his accumulated score in four previous years and made 158 hits and 52 RBIs along with four home-runs. His averages also improved to .285, better than his all previous years.
He played his last game on September 10, 1935 for the Cincinnati Reds. He passed away on January 2, 1974 in Long Beach at the age of 69.
Continued in Part 4
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