This Ray made history with 100th home run

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ANAHEIM -- In the fifth inning of Wednesday’s game at Oracle Park, Brandon Lowe spotted a changeup left up and over the plate, unloaded his left-handed swing and bashed the ball a projected 421 feet out to center field. Lowe hopped out of the batter’s box and started the same trot he’d made 99 times before.

Lowe’s two-run homer in the Rays’ 6-1 win was the 100th of his career, a milestone made even more impressive by how quickly he got there. It was Lowe’s 477th career game, making him the fastest primary second baseman in AL/NL history to reach the century mark.

“There have been some pretty good second basemen throughout the history of baseball. So to be the fastest one, it’s really cool,” Lowe told reporters after Wednesday’s game. “It is a really cool highlighted stat right there. To be the fastest of all time is pretty cool.”

Yes, Lowe got there faster than Jeff Kent, the all-time leader in home runs among second basemen, who hit his 100th homer in his 697th game. Faster than Dan Uggla, who needed 509 games to get there. And quicker than contemporary second basemen like Robinson Canó (797 games), Chase Utley (580), Jose Altuve (1,131) and Ozzie Albies (636).

“To be the first one in baseball, with how long this game has been played, is really special,” reliever Colin Poche said. “He's a really talented player, and we're really lucky to have him on our team.”

“That guy's been the cornerstone of this team for the past couple of years,” added outfielder Josh Lowe. “It's just awesome to see him reach that achievement.”

Lowe’s latest blast put him in rare company in franchise history, too, as it broke a tie with newly minted Hall of Famer Fred McGriff on the club’s all-time home run list. Lowe now stands alone in seventh place and could very well surpass Carl Crawford (sixth, 104) by the end of the season. The 29-year-old has also moved into 12th on Tampa Bay’s all-time WAR leaderboard, according to Baseball-Reference.

“It’s awesome. To understand kind of where I started and everything else like that, it’s a pretty cool accomplishment,” he said. “No matter who you are in the big leagues, 100 home runs is pretty special.”

This is only Lowe’s sixth season in the Majors. A handful of them have been shortened by injuries, including the month he missed this year, and arguably his most dominant performance came in the pandemic-shortened 2020 campaign. During his lone full season in 2021, he hit 39 homers and drove in 99 runs with an adjusted OPS+ that was 40 percent better than the league average.

For all the frustration over his recent back issues and the struggles they may have caused him at the plate the last two years, Lowe has essentially been himself since his July 4 return from the injured list. Over his last 32 games, he’s hitting .250/.342/.491 with seven homers and 19 RBIs.

“Congrats to Brandon. One hundred home runs at the big league level is pretty special,” manager Kevin Cash said. “He's very capable of adding more to that.”

Lowe certainly wouldn’t mind hitting a few more home runs and historic milestones.

“It would be really nice to hit more than 100,” he said.