Wednesday, May 31, 2017

TURN BACK THE CLOCK- EDDIE MATHEWS SLAMS HIS 500TH CAREER HOME RUN

Next up in my running “Turn Back the Clock” series is Hall of Fame slugger Eddie Mathews and his 500th career home run, hit while he was a member of the Houston Astros on July 14th 1967:


At the time Mathews became only the seventh 500-HR hitter in Major League history, on his way to 512 homers in his 17-year career, spent mainly with the Braves organization from Boston, to Milwaukee, on to Atlanta.
A beast of a hitter immediately upon reaching the Majors, in 1953 he hit 47 homers along with 135 runs batted in at the age of 21!
It would be the first of three straight 40-HR seasons, as well as nine straight 30+ homer campaigns, 10 overall.
By the time he retired after the 1968 season he easily wrote his way into Cooperstown, elected in 1978 with just under 80% of the vote.