MLB star breaks nearly 30-year-old record with unprecedented at-bat
From a hitter’s point of view, the ideal at-bat is one in which he works the count, chipping away at the precious resource that is a pitcher’s allotment of pitches, then gets on base. That ensures the pitcher has to expend more pitches on the next batter in order to purchase the other precious resource in pitching — outs.
But then again, making a pitcher pay 21 pitches for an out even if you don’t get on base is a pretty decent middle ground, and it’s one San Francisco Giants first baseman Brandon Belt achieved in the first inning of a Sunday game against the Los Angeles Angels. In the process, he and the Angels’ Jaime Barria broke the MLB record for most pitches in a single at-bat.
Belt fouled off 16 two-strike deliveries from Barria before flying out to right field to end the at-bat on a bit of a sour note.
The pitch chart for the at-bat is a thing of beauty, even if it does show a lack of plate discipline for Belt. While it’s necessary to swing defensively to avoid looking at strike three, the 12th pitch of the at-bat would have been ball four had Belt not fouled it off.
Even when they weren’t getting on base, the Giants were putting good wood on the ball as a team.
They ended up with four runs on 13 hits, going a collective 13-for-39 (.333) in the game and putting relentless pressure on the seven pitchers the Angels ended up using throughout nine innings.
Only one Angels pitcher, Keynan Middleton, who entered the game in the ninth, avoided giving up a hit.
Belt went 3-for-5 for the contest, so that flyout in the first inning didn’t place too much of a damper on his offensive production.
He also hit a towering home run to right field in the fifth inning, accounting for the fourth Giants run in a game they ultimately won 4-2.
Barria, meanwhile, threw an absurd 49 pitches in the first inning, though amazingly enough, he held the Giants scoreless in that frame.
Officially, Barria went two-plus innings. He loaded the bases in the first before getting out of the jam, then managed to retire the side in order in the second.
In the third, however, Barria once again faced the top of the lineup, and after Joe Panik singled to left, Belt had another nice work-the-count at-bat in which he fouled off four pitches before hitting the eighth one to right field for a base hit. Barria then promptly walked the next batter, Andrew McCutchen.
With the bases loaded and Barria up to 77 pitches, 29 of them thrown to Belt, he was pulled for Nelson Ramirez, who induced a double play out of Buster Posey that scored Panik from third. But Ramirez then gave up a two-run homer to Evan Longoria that scored Belt.
And just when Barria thought his Sunday couldn’t get any worse …
… He was sent to the minors. Ouch.
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