Rookies showing out, vets making history highlight stats of the week

Here’s our weekly look at 10 mind-blowing notes from the last week in baseball (May 4-10).

Another week, another Rays stat: The Rays went 22-0 when scoring first before losing in such fashion on Saturday. That’s tied with the 1884 St. Louis Maroons for the longest streak of wins when scoring first to begin a season. They enter the weekend 24-2 (.923) when scoring first this season. The best such winning percentage for a year in the last 50 seasons is the 2001 Mariners’ .905 (86-9).

Miller time: Bryce Miller had a sparkling second career start Sunday, throwing six scoreless innings with just two hits allowed. He became the second pitcher since at least 1901 to go at least six innings and allow two hits or fewer in each of his first two career appearances, joining Ken Cloude in 1997, also for the Mariners. He’s one of five pitchers with at least 15 strikeouts and no more than one walk in his first two career games, joining Masahiro Tanaka in 2014 (18 K, 1 BB), Johnny Cueto in 2008 (18 K, 0 BB), Nick Kingham in 2018 (16 K, 1 BB) and Andy Sonnanstine in 2007 (15 K, 0 BB).

Clutch Mookie: Mookie Betts sparked a comeback victory for the Dodgers on Sunday Night Baseball in San Diego, with a two-out, game-tying home run in the top of the ninth. It was Betts’ third game-tying homer in the ninth inning or later since the start of the 2020 season, tied for most in MLB in that span. He’s tied with Ty France, Fernando Tatis Jr. and Rowdy Tellez.

Your weekly Ohtani update: With seven strikeouts on Tuesday, Shohei Ohtani now has 507 in his career. Along with his 135 career homers, he’s now passed Babe Ruth for the most career strikeouts as a pitcher among players with 100 home runs hit. He and Ruth (501 K, 714 HR) are the only players with 500 and 100, respectively.

Diaz for three: Rookie Jordan Diaz entered Tuesday with one career homer in 89 MLB plate appearances. Then, he hit three in one game at Yankee Stadium. He became the third rookie in A’s history with a three-homer game, joining Mark McGwire (June 27, 1987) and Mickey Cochrane (May 21, 1925). Diaz is the second rookie with such a game against the Yankees, joining Ronald Guzmán on Aug. 10, 2018, in a game that was also at Yankee Stadium.

Young Álvarez: Mets catcher Francisco Álvarez hit two home runs on Tuesday in Cincinnati. At 21 years and 171 days old, Álvarez became the fifth-youngest player since 1900 with a multi-homer game while playing catcher. He was older than only Butch Wynegar (Sept. 22, 1976: 20 y, 192 d), Joe Mauer (June 30, 2004: 21 y, 72 d), Shanty Hogan (June 21, 1927: 21 y, 92 d) and Bill Freehan (May 5, 1963: 21 y, 157 d).

Extreme power from Elly: Elly De La Cruz, MLB’s No. 7 prospect, has shown strong power so far this year with Triple-A Louisville. On Tuesday, he had a 118.8 mph RBI double, the hardest-hit batted ball so far in 2023 in the Majors or Triple-A, as well as home runs with exit velocities of 117.1 mph and 116.6 mph. No team has had three 116-plus mph batted balls of any kind in an MLB game under Statcast tracking (since ’15), and De La Cruz had three -- all extra-base hits.

Classic JV: When Justin Verlander made his season debut Thursday, he became the eighth multi-time Cy Young winner to pitch for the Mets, the most of any franchise, per the Elias Sports Bureau. He joined Tom Glavine, Pedro Martinez, Bret Saberhagen, Johan Santana, Tom Seaver, Jacob deGrom and Max Scherzer. In his second start Wednesday, he had his 33rd career outing of at least seven innings with two or fewer hits allowed. That tied Randy Johnson and Roger Clemens for most such starts since 1900, behind only Nolan Ryan (62).

Even more long homers for Acuña: Ronald Acuña Jr. hit a 470-foot home run on Wednesday. Acuña now has four 470-plus-foot homers in his career, tied with Giancarlo Stanton, Miguel Sanó and Trevor Story for second-most in MLB since the start of 2018, behind only Mike Trout (five). He has 27 career 440-plus-foot home runs, including the playoffs. That’s three more than anyone else in MLB since the start of 2018 (including playoffs).

400: Kenley Jansen recorded his 400th career save on Wednesday night, becoming the seventh pitcher to reach that mark. His three fastest pitches were 98.7 mph, 98.5 mph and 98.4 mph. The last time he had thrown a pitch that hard was Aug. 27, 2016. Jansen has now thrown 11 pitches at 97.0 mph or faster this season. That’s more 97+ mph pitches than he threw from 2017-22 combined (eight).