GLENN GUILBEAU, Tiger Rag Editor
Former LSU baseball superstar Dylan Crews is already about to tie and possibly break a Major League Baseball record in just his second season with the Washington Nationals in the Big Leagues.
But it’s not a good one.
Crews, who was the second player picked in the 2023 MLB Draft after leading the Tigers to the national championship that June, struck out eight consecutive times in the Nationals’ games on Sunday and Saturday against Philadelphia. He struck out five times on Saturday and three times on Sunday. Former LSU ace Aaron Nola of Philadelphia struck Crews out twice in a 5-1 loss to the Nationals on Sunday.
The MLB record for non-pitchers is nine straight strikeouts, according to The Baseball Almanac, and is held by seven players, most recently Boston’s Yoan Moncada, who did it over four games from Sept. 5 through Sept. 12 in 2016.
UPDATE: Crews avoided tying the record on Monday night in a 4-2 loss at Toronto as he grounded out to third in his first at-bat in the third inning to end his strikeout streak at eight in a row. He then flew out to center field in the fifth before starting another strikeout streak. He fanned in the seventh and in the ninth to end the game. Crews is 0-for-15 on the season with one walk, one runs scored and 10 strikeouts in four games.
Other hitters with nine consecutive strikeouts are Hall of Famer Reggie Jackson while with Oakland on July 6-11 of 1987, Bo Jackson of Kansas City from Sept. 16-19 of 1988, Steve Balboni of Kansas City from Aug. 20-22 in 1984, Eric Davis of Cincinnati in just two games on April 24-25 of 1987 and Mark Reynolds of Arizona from August 18-21 of 2007.
Adolfo Phillips was the first MLB player to strike out nine straight times in three games from June 8-11 in 1966. The next season, Phillips reversed that curse exactly a year later by hitting home runs in three consecutive at-bats in an 18-10 win over the New York Mets on June 11, 1967, in Wrigley Field.
When Reggie Jackson, who is a member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., struck out nine straight times, it was in his last year of an illustrious career. He remains the MLB record holder in career times having struck out with 2,597 from 1967-87. But he also hit 563 career home runs for 14th on MLB’s career list. And “Mr. October” hit three consecutive home runs in Game 6 of the New York Yankees’ World Series championship in 1977 won over the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Bo Jackson, who was also an NFL star running back, hit 141 home runs from 1986-94 in MLB and struck out 841 times.
Last season in 31 games with the Nationals, Crews hit .219 with three home runs and eight RBIs with a .288 on-base average. He struck out 26 times with 11 walks. Crews also struck out a lot while in minor league baseball in 2023 and ’24 with 130 in 135 games. He hit .275 with 18 home runs and 97 RBIs in the minors with 50 walks.
At LSU in 2023, Crews struck out just 46 times with 71 walks while hitting .426 with 18 home runs and 70 RBIs.
“I don’t even have to look at it. It happens every year when they’ve got a phenom coming in,” former Detroit Tigers pitcher Denny McLain said on “Talk Louisiana” with Jim Engster on Monday morning. “These guys in college, while they’re phenoms in college, they’ve never seen what fastballs do what fastballs do in the Major Leagues. They’re getting him out with hard inside fastballs. He has to go back in the that cage and learn a couple of things about hitting that baseball.”
McLain was 31-6 with a 1.96 ERA in 1968 for the World Series champion Detroit Tigers and won the Cy Young award in 1968 and ’69.
Be the first to comment