Giancarlo Stanton is a bona fide slugger.
Although he’s never had a single 40+ homer season in his young career, he’s already knocked in 246 total long balls and is perennially atop the exit velocity and home run distance charts (he’d still be the contact king, too, if it weren’t for Aaron Judge).
But he’s taking his slugging ways an extra step further this season, as evidence by his career-high 38th home run of the year last night
Take a look:
That homer was 113.8 MPH off the bat and traveled a distance of 438 feet. That’s no cheapy – that’s a monster blast. Moreover, it brought his season slash line up to .277/.370/.615 for the year, which features a terrifying .338 ISO.
But that’s not the best part.
This is: Stanton has now beaten his previous high (set twice, once in 2012 and again in 2014), with his 38th home run of the year. But, if you look at the schedule, you may notice that were not quite at the end of September. Indeed, we’re at the beginning of August and that means there’s a whole lot of baseball left to be played.
And, according to his ZiPS and Steamer projections, Stanton should just barely crack the 50 homer mark by the end of the season. And if he does manage to do that, he’ll have the first 50+ homer season since Chris Davis did it in 2013. Indeed, it would be just the third 50-homer season in the last DECADE!
There’s a lot more to this game than crushing long balls, but it’s definitely the best part. Let’s see if Stanton can reset the clock and hit 50 homers for the first time in quite a while.