Ichiro Suzuki had an amazing career in Major League Baseball, but it’s likely over, at least on the field. Ichiro’s pseudo-retirement / move into the Mariners’ front office meant Adrian Beltre was no longer chasing a moving target: on Wednesday, that meant \Beltre was finally able to pass Ichiro as the all-time hits leader among foreign-born players in MLB.
Adrian Beltre passed Ichiro Suzuki to become the foreign-born hits leader
Thursday’s Say Hey, Baseball looks at one of our favorite players passing another for an internationally flavored record.
Photo by Ronald Martinez/Getty Images
Does this mean Beltre also has more hits than Pete Rose, too? No, no, this is just hits in MLB by a foreign-born player: Beltre definitely has more of those than Rose, but so does every foreign-born player with at least one knock in their MLB career.
Beltre officially passed his former Seattle Mariners teammate with a double against Kenta Maeda, giving him 3,090 career hits. He had entered the day tied with Ichiro, and added two more hits on top of that double to put him at 3,092.
While Beltre isn’t the slugging star he used to be, he’s still thriving at 39, as he’s batting .311/.366/.417, and still can help out on defense. This is the final year of his contract with the Rangers, and it’s unclear how much longer Beltre wants to play, but if he keeps on hitting, he’ll keep getting chances to extend the record he just took control over.
Throw in, too, that Beltre now ranks alone at 22nd on the all-time MLB hits list after snapping the tie with Ichiro, and he has more than just the internationally flavored records to contend with. Next up is Hall of Famer Dave Winfield at 3,110, and then Alex Rodriguez’s 3,115: then Beltre will be in the top-20 all-time. If he keeps on batting over .300 and stays on the field, he’ll make headway toward top 15, too: Tony Gwynn (3,141), Robin Yount (3,142), Paul Waner (3,152), George Brett (3,154), and Cal Ripken (3,184) are in the way of that goal at present.
- The Orioles are going to trade Manny Machado. This is assured. What we don’t know yet is if the Os are going to screw it up. We just kind of assume they will.
- Here’s the double Beltre hit off of Kenta Maeda to pass Ichiro.
- Ryan Zimmerman spoke with Whitney McIntosh about the Capitals’ Stanley Cup victory, D.C. as a sports town, and Washington hosting this year’s MLB All-Star Game.
- Freddie Freeman hit a home run on the anniversary of his mother’s death, and it understandably felt different than his other homers.
- All right, that’s heavy for the morning, so let’s dive into a few less-heavy topics. First up: a Baltimore bar is trying to make Chris Davis’ season hurt less by giving you free shots whenever he does get a hit.
- The St. Paul Saints changed their name to the Raccoons, because no one loves a topical marketing stunt like baseball.
- Reliever Josh Hader would lead 10 different teams in strikeouts this season. He’s going to end up with more strikeouts than so. many. starters.
- Amazin Avenue writes that it’s time for the Mets to take control of their roster and their future.
- The wives of Cubs and Brewers players played a charity softball game.
- Lookout Landing wrote up the situational heroes of the Mariners’ offense so far in 2018.
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