CINCINNATI — Julio Rodríguez on Monday added one other main milestone to a resume that’s rapidly changing into filled with them.
Contemporary off incomes his first profession American League Participant of the Month nod, Rodríguez ripped a homer to right-center area through the fourth inning in opposition to the Reds that put him into the MLB document books: He is the primary participant to register not less than 25 homers and 25 steals in every of his first two seasons.
The 22-year-old has a uncommon mixture of energy, velocity and youth, as solely eight others have managed not less than that many homers and steals in certainly one of their first two years in The Present.
Rodríguez’s twenty fifth blast was amongst his most majestic of 2023, a 411-foot solo shot in opposition to a 95.4 mph middle-middle fastball from Reds righty Daniel Duarte that back-spun its means nicely past the right-center-field wall at Nice American Ball Park.
He’s additionally racked up 36 steals, placing him in place to probably turn out to be the fourth participant with a 25-40 12 months in his age-22 season or youthful, together with Alex Rodriguez in 1998 (42 homers, 46 steals), César Cedeño in 1973 (25 homers, 56 steals) and Mike Trout in 2012 (30 homers, 49 stolen bases).
Earlier on Monday, Rodríguez mentioned being named the Mariners’ first AL Participant of the Month since Nelson Cruz in April 2015.
“It’s undoubtedly been quite a lot of work, however quite a lot of group effort, too, that we have been all in collectively,” Rodríguez stated. “It was fairly cool. It was a fairly cool month, and I am simply trying ahead to maintain constructing on to it.”
In August, he led all certified AL hitters in hits (45), doubles (10), RBIs (30), stolen bases (11), batting common (.429), on-base share (.474), slugging share (.724) and OPS (1.198). He additionally crushed seven homers and recorded 13 multihit video games through the month, together with six video games with not less than three and 5 with not less than 4.
Rodríguez’s rise to being arguably the Majors’ hottest hitter over the previous month has coincided with the Mariners thrusting themselves into first place within the AL West.