The Hammer gets one step closer to baseball immortality.
Braves Franchise History
1974: Atlanta Braves slugger Hank Aaron blasts a historic three-run home run against Cincinnati Reds pitcher Jack Billingham on Opening Day. The home run is the 714th of Aaron’s career, tying him with the great Babe Ruth for the most in major league history.
MLB History
1993: At Camden Yards, William Jefferson Clinton becomes the first U.S. President to throw the first pitch of the season from the pitcher’s mound.
1994: The Cleveland Indians inaugurate Jacobs Field with a 4 – 3 victory over the Seattle Mariners. Eddie Murray hits a home run for the Indians, who played their last game at Cleveland Stadium in 1993. Playing his 2,403rd game at first base, Murray becomes major league’s all-time leader in games played at that position.
2005: Opening Day highlights include the Baltimore Orioles’ Sammy Sosa and Rafael Palmeiro who become the first pair of teammates to have at least 500 career home runs apiece. Sosa opens the season with 574 career HR and Palmeiro 551.
2011: Rangers RF Nelson Cruz ties a mark set by Willie Mays in 1971 and Mark McGwire in 1998 by becoming the third player to homer in his team’s first four games to start the season. SS Elvis Andrus joins in the fun, ending a 705 at-bat home run drought dating back to 2009 when he connects in the 1st inning. Texas defeats Seattle, 6 – 4, to move to 4-0 on the year. For the Mariners, Erik Bedard is the loser in his first major league start since undergoing shoulder surgery on August 14, 2009.
2013: The Rangers sign SS Elvis Andrus to an eight-year contract extension that will pay him $120 million through 2022, continuing a recent trend of teams signing their star players over the long term in order to ensure cost certainty.
2023: Sandy Alcantara, the major league leader in complete games last year, tosses the first one of the seasons in a masterful shutout against the Twins that requires only 100 pitches and 1 hour and 57 minutes. Avisail Garcia’s solo shot off Kenta Maeda in the 2nd accounts for the lone run in a 1 – 0 Marlins win.
Information for this article was found via Baseball Reference, NationalPastime.com and Today in Baseball History.