Another great day for baseball (and home runs) in the States, but it's overseas that gives us the best news. That's right, Manny Ramirez has hit his fifth home run as a member of the EDA Rhinos in Taiwan. On the blast to left field, he gives us his backwards bounce away from the plate before trotting on to his second slowest trot of the year. The final tater trot time was 29.44 seconds, only a bit behind his 29.83 second trot on April 23. (Thanks to Manny Does Taiwan for keeping us updated.)
Let's get to the trots!
Home Run of the Day: Miguel Cabrera #1, Detroit Tigers – 25.32 seconds [video]
It doesn't seem fair to let Miguel Cabrera hit against the Astros, especially in Minute Maid Park, but it's the new reality. As is Miggy's pair of long home runs on Saturday afternoon. I don't even know where this first one landed. At 25.32 seconds, his trot was the second slowest of the day. Cabrera's second trot wasn't much quicker, clocking in at 24.94 seconds.
Slowest Trot: Alfonso Soriano #2, Chicago Cubs – 25.96 seconds [video]
Another pair of ultra-slow trots, this time coming from the Cubs' left fielder. However, with Soriano's initial trot clocking in at a relatively speedy 24.19 seconds, Cabrera takes the crown for slowest average trot of the day (25.13 seconds vs. 25.07 seconds).
Quickest Trot: Jean Segura, Milwaukee Brewers – 17.02* seconds [video]
This is the absolute worst thing about a national broadcast (well, not really, but still…): with only one camera angle on any given tater trot, there is a much greater chance of having a difficult or impossible to clock trot time. Jon Jay's trot, for example, was untimeable due to Fox's choice to zoom in on his face as he crossed the plate. There was no way to know whic step touched home plate. That was almost the case for Segura here, which, considering how fast he actually rounded the bases, would have been a travesty.
Thankfully, we have some hints about which step Segura completed his trot on. First, the camera pulls back to show Segura only one or two steps past the plate. Working backwards from there, you will notice Segura looking down and stomping his foot down with a bit of emphasis one or two steps before the camera moves. Both of those movements (the eyes down towards the ground and the extra hop in his step as his foot comes down) are signals for when Segura actually touched home plate. There is still a chance that I'm wrong (thus the asterisk), but I feel very comfortable giving Segura this 17.02 second trot time.
In San Francisco, Andres Torres' 17.77 second trot seemed like a good bet for quickest of the day.
All of Today's Trots Alfonso Soriano #2...25.96 Manny Machado........20.38 Miguel Cabrera #1....25.32 Clint Barmes.........20.31 Victor Martinez......25.06 Mark Trumbo..........20.21 Miguel Cabrera #2....24.94 J.J. Hardy...........20.15 Alfonso Soriano #1...24.19 Aaron Hicks..........20.08 Marcell Ozuna........24.19 Daniel Descalso......20.01* Carlos Corporan......24.19 Shin-Soo Choo........19.97 Nick Swisher.........24.14 Michael Saunders #2..19.88 Carlos Gonzalez......22.95 Chris Stewart........19.47 Lyle Overbay.........22.63 Michael Saunders #1..19.34 Nolan Reimold........22.58 Chris Valaika........19.28 Allen Craig..........22.51 Nolan Arenado........19.22 Guillermo Quiroz.....21.95 Dustin Ackley........19.1 Ian Kinsler..........21.9 A.J. Pollock.........18.7 Chris Denorfia.......21.84 Carlos Gomez.........18.69 Starling Marte.......21.69 Andres Torres........17.77 Jason Kipnis.........21.45 Jean Segura..........17.02* Craig Gentry.........21.2 Jon Jay..............N/A A.J. Ellis...........21.2
Click here for the ongoing 2013 Tater Trot Tracker Leaderboard. You can also follow @TaterTrotTrkr on Twitter for more up-to-the-minute trot times.
