1 fun highlight for each new '24 HOF candidate

1 fun highlight for each new '24 HOF candidate

January 21st, 2024

Some of baseball's lighter moments in 2023 featured star players such as J.T. Realmuto, Adolis García and Shohei Ohtani. Perhaps those clips won't be on their potential Hall of Fame reels many years from now, but it goes to show that in this sport, something fun, quirky, interesting or weird can happen to any player on the diamond. 

The 12 newcomers on the 2024 Hall of Fame ballot can all testify to that fact. In celebration of these Cooperstown candidates, let’s look back at one such moment from each player’s career.

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We could take the easy route here and pick the most memorable highlight of Bautista's career. You know the one. Not every celebratory bat flip ends up being memorialized in a cornfield. But we should also remember all of the fun Bautista had with MLB mascots during his career.

In 2017, he reenacted his famous postseason shot, but with the roles reversed as Bautista pitched to Stomper, the A's elephant. He had multiple interactions with Orbit, the Astros' mascot. However, nothing can top the Phillie Phanatic. Before a 2016 Spring Training game, the Phanatic and Bautista engaged in a physical fitness challenge ... and the Phanatic won somehow.

Adrián Beltré
Beltré is a likely first-ballot Hall of Famer and a perfect fit for this list of weird highlights. He gave us a treasure trove of laugh-out-loud moments. From his evasive baserunning maneuvers to his full-body home run hacks to his big brother-little brother relationship with Elvis Andrus, Beltré was simultaneously one of the game's best players and one of its goofiest. Thus, we will cheat a little bit and not limit ourselves to just one highlight. Why do that when we have a full montage of Beltré bloopers available?


OK, in this case, we will make the obvious choice. Colon's home run in 2016 was a "Where were you when ...?" moment. Before May 7, 2016, Colon's plate appearances were most remembered for how his helmet rarely stayed atop his head whenever he took a big, usually fruitless swing. But then his bat and an incoming fastball met at the perfect point to create one of the most unexpected plays in baseball history.

This highlight earns extra points for involving another player making his debut on the Hall of Fame ballot this year, pitcher James Shields. He probably didn't think this was so great at the time, but he seemed to take it all in stride eventually.

Adrián González
More fun with mascots!

González incorporated boxing into his offseason training regimen during the second half of his 15-year career. He trained at a gym owned by Freddie Roach, a Hall of Fame boxing trainer who was in the corner of Manny Pacquiao, James Toney and other world champions in the ring. González put his skills in "the sweet science" to good use when he faced off against Raymond, the Rays' mascot, in 2016.

In a bout that lasted all of about 10 seconds, González landed a right jab and a straight left while dodging a couple of wild swings from Tampa Bay's blue, furry creature. Then, with Kiké Hernández causing a distraction, Raymond turned directly into a roundhouse punch, giving El Titan the KO victory.


An honorable mention here goes to the Rockies' 2008 commercial parodying Holliday's victorious and controversial slide/faceplant to win the '07 NL tiebreaker game versus the Padres.

The pick for this list took place about a decade later against those Padres. It's technically the second bat flip mentioned in this article, but unlike Joey Bats' authoritative launch, this one was completely unintentional. The scene: Holliday draws a walk in the sixth inning and goes to discard his bat as he begins his jaunt to first base. But instead of throwing the bat toward the Cardinals' dugout, Holliday flings it straight up into the air, turning it momentarily into a twirling weapon. For a split second, home plate umpire Tim Timmons must have seen his life flash before his eyes.

Victor Martinez
A bum hamstring kept Martinez from starting either of the Tigers' first two games of the 2016 season, but he found a somewhat rare way to make an impact. On Opening Day, he pinch-hit in the ninth inning and padded Detroit's lead over the Marlins with a homer from the left side of the plate. The next day, he came up as a pinch-hitter in the eighth, turned around to the right side of the dish and went deep again

Only five players have appeared as a pinch-hitter and immediately homered on consecutive days in the seven seasons since Martinez did the trick. None of them showcased their switch-hitting talents while doing so, however.


Mauer magic. That's the only way to explain this next highlight. It's one thing to field a ball behind your back, but Mauer reacts so quickly once this foul ball caroms off the Nationals Park backstop, completes a no-look snag with his mitt and calmly exchanges the ball with the umpire in one smooth motion, it's as if that's just something he does in every game. And yet, have you seen any other catcher make a play like this? Next-level coolness from the Twins legend.


A lot of MLB players have a signature move. Sammy Sosa has the homer hop. Any jump throw from deep in the hole at shortstop is now considered Jeterian. Youngsters across the Dominican Republic are doing the Soto Shuffle.

Phillips has his own move, too: The behind-the-back toss from second base to record an out. He did this often.

Seriously, he did this a lot. He did this all the time. The man never stopped flipping grounders from behind his back!

It's hard to pick a favorite, so we'll instead choose a play that saw Phillips on the other side of a groundout. In 2016, he tapped a ball back to Braves pitcher Tyrell Jenkins. There was no sense in hustling down the first-base line; Phillips knew he was out. So, perhaps in recognition of a well-executed pitch, Phillips waited for Jenkins to apply the tag and offered a high-five in return.

José Reyes
What do Reyes and Ohtani have in common? They have each homered one day after allowing multiple dingers on the mound. Ohtani did this as recently as July 2022. Reyes, in his lone MLB pitching appearance, did the two-time American League MVP one better in 2018. That's when the infielder served up two homers to the Nats in a 25-4 loss that featured a few laughs with Ryan Zimmerman. The next day, Reyes clubbed two homers for the Mets.

Perhaps the Dodgers' new $700 million man will pull off this double in the future, but for now, Reyes is the only player in the Modern Era (since 1900) to allow multiple home runs and hit multiple home runs on consecutive days.


Starting pitchers have a lot of time on their hands. They prepare diligently to give their best on the field every fifth day, but how do they fill those four days in between? They could mess around with their teammates, try to perfect their bat flips or wear paper cups over their ears.

But the best way Shields killed time came in 2018, when he sat in the White Sox dugout during a game versus the Astros and apparently set out to blow the biggest chewing-gum bubble possible. It was a tremendous success.

"People could live in that bubble," said play-by-play announcer Jason Benetti.


Utley was one of the very best players in the sport from 2005-10, one of the leaders on the Phillies' 2008 World Series championship squad and revered by the club's passionate fan base for his hard-nosed style of play for 13 seasons.

So when Utley was traded to the Dodgers in 2015 and returned to Philly about one year later for the first time as a visitor, those fans at Citizens Bank Park couldn't wait to shower him with cheers.

As Utley came to the plate in the top of the first inning, he got a standing ovation. When he homered in the fifth, he got a curtain call. When he crushed a grand slam in the seventh, he got another curtain call. Three standing ovations for a visiting player who had just driven in five runs against the home team? In the words of the great Harry Kalas, Chase Utley was "the man" in Philadelphia.


Although Wright earned some down-ballot MVP votes in 2005, he had to wait until 2006 to reach his first All-Star Game. You may know that he bopped his only Midsummer Classic home run in his first plate appearance, lining a pitch from the Tigers' Kenny Rogers over the left-field wall at Pittsburgh's PNC Park. That clout also came on the first pitch of the at-bat, which put Wright into a very exclusive club. He was the first player to hit a home run on the first pitch he saw in an All-Star Game since at least 1988, when pitch counts began being tracked. The Cubs' Willson Contreras also did this in 2018.

There's a fun fact that you can tell your friends next time you're at a bar. Maybe Wright will even be there.