Ryon Healy crushed a 480-foot rainmaker that asserted its place in Statcast lore
In
Over the fountains. That ball was 20 feet shy of being a 500-foot moonshot, by the way:
.@statcast had Ryon Healy's HR at 111.6 MPH off the bat and projected at 480ft... #Wow
— Daren Willman (@darenw) September 16, 2016
That's good for the longest homer of the Statcast™ era by a member of the A's (ahead of
Worth noting that Healy's homer is also the second-longest of the year that was not hit at Coors Field.
— Jane Lee (@JaneMLB) September 16, 2016
It's also the kind of blast that elicits excited reactions from teammates:
Healy: "I don’t think I’ve hit one that far in my life." Semien "was in shock" when he saw it. Vogt says, "I was screaming my head off."
— Jane Lee (@JaneMLB) September 16, 2016
And managers:
Melvin never saw Healy's homer land. Says, "I’d like to say when I was here in ’92 I hit one up there in BP, but I don’t think I did."
— Jane Lee (@JaneMLB) September 16, 2016
As for where it ranks in 2016 in terms of projected distance:
Longest projected HRs this season:
— Daren Willman (@darenw) September 16, 2016
Stanton 504ft
Mazara 492ft
Mark Reynolds 484ft
Tom Murphy 481ft
Ryon Healy 480ft < Tonight
Stanton 475ft
That's a pretty good poke.
Oakland dropped 14 runs on Thursday, which serves as a testament to hitting the ball very, very hard on a consistent basis:
The @Athletics have batted balls of
— Daren Willman (@darenw) September 16, 2016
111.6 MPH
109.3
105.4
104.6
104.3
104.1
103.4
103.4
103.2
100.7
100
99.7
99.6
That's how you score 14