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Anthony Rizzo reached a career milestone during today’s 7-1 win against the Pittsburgh Pirates when launched his 150th career home run as a big league player.
Career home run number 150 for Rizzo!!! #ThatsCub pic.twitter.com/0jtKqTlvsA
— Adam Nissen (@nissen54) June 18, 2017
The home run today also put him in the team lead this season with 16 bombs and capped off a nice day that saw him also hit a single and a double from his new spot in the batting order.
In case you’ve been under a rock this past week, Rizzo has been doing a shit load of damage to opposing pitching as the team’s new lead-off man. Moving your best power hitter to the one-hole is something most teams wouldn’t even think of doing but as crazy as it sounds — it appears to be working.
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Cubs' Anthony Rizzo since becoming a leadoff hitter: .429/.478/.571/1.049, 3 HR, 8 RBI, 2 BB, 5 K.
— Devan Fink (@DevanFink) June 18, 2017
In addition to his home run today being his 150th of his career and also his team-leading 16th, it also moved him to 14th all-time on the Cubs home run list bypassing a former Cubs great (and personal favorite of mine), Mark Grace.
He’s also only 25 homers behind another one of my all-time favorites, Andre Dawson.
Rizzo moves past Mark Grace on #Cubs career home run leaderboard:
11. Soriano 181
12. Lee 179
13. Dawson 174
14. Rizzo 149
15. Grace 148— The Athletic (@TheAthleticChi) June 18, 2017
If you’ll notice, that’s not a typo that Rizzo has 149 home runs as a Cub. The only other MLB home run he hit came in 2011 when he was a member of the San Diego Padres (who the Cubs will play tomorrow.)
When you factor in that Rizzo is still only 27-years-old and has consistently hit 30 home runs for the past three seasons, I don’t see any reason why he can’t make a run at being a career top 5 all-time home run hitter for the Chicago Cubs — even if it’s as a lead-off guy.
