Shohei Ohtani becomes first Japanese-born player to hit for the cycle
Not even a power outage at Tropicana Field could stop Shohei Ohtani.
In fact, the Los Angeles Angels designated hitter provided his own power surge in their 5-3 victory against the Tampa Bay Rays, and made some pretty cool history in the process.
Ohtani became the first Japanese-born player in Major League Baseball history to hit for the cycle, completing his feat with a single in the seventh inning.
Shohei Ohtani is the first Japanese-born player in @MLB history to hit for the #cycle. pic.twitter.com/lW1fkqzYR5
— MLB Stats (@MLBStats) June 14, 2019
That’s right. Ohtani only needed four at-bats to complete a feat that Ichiro Suzuki, Hideki Matsui and many other notable Japanese hitters had previously been unable to achieve.
Ohtani got himself and the Angels off to a great start, launching a three-run home run in the very first inning. He continued pounding the baseball his next time up, ripping a double leading off the third inning,
The only real drama came in the fourth inning, when a storm-related power outage forced a 34-minute delay. Once power was restored, Ohtani started another mini-rally with a fifth-inning triple. He would later score on Albert Pujols’ 200th Angels home run, which made him a footnote in two more pretty cool historic occurrences.
Albert Pujols just hit his 200th homer as a member of the @Angels, making him the 6th player in MLB history to hit 200+ homers for two different teams.
The others:
Jimmie Foxx
Mark McGwire
Rafael Palmeiro
Ken Griffey Jr.
Manny Ramirez#TheHaloWay— Stats By STATS (@StatsBySTATS) June 14, 2019
Albert Pujols collected his 2,019th career RBI in 2019 (tonight)
Alex Rodriguez collected his 2,015th career RBI in 2015
Henry Aaron collected his 1,972nd career RBI in 1972
Lou Gehrig collected his 1,938th career RBI in 1938
those are the last 4 players to do that— Christopher Kamka (@ckamka) June 14, 2019
Ohtani is the eighth player in Angels history to hit for the cycle. The most recent was Mike Trout on May 21, 2013. He’s also just the sixth ever designated hitter to complete a cycle.
It’s the second cycle in MLB this season. Jorge Polanco of the Minnesota Twins completed the cycle on April 5 against the Philadelphia Phillies.
Ohtani, 24, missed the Angels’ first 34 games while recovering from offseason Tommy John surgery. The recovery will limit the two-way start to hitting duties only for the entire 2019 season, but he’s expected to begin ramping up pitching efforts with an eye toward a 2020 return to the hill.
Once completely healthy, the question will then become: Can Ohtani become the first MLB player to complete a cycle and pitch a no-hitter?
More from Yahoo Sports:
