Miguel Cabrera Breaks MLB Record for Home Runs by a Venezuelan-Born Player
With one swing of the bat, Miguel Cabrera forever put himself in the record books and Major League Baseball history.
The Detroit Tigers infielder hit his 400th career home run on Saturday, May 16 against the St. Louis Cardinals. Cabrera is now the 52nd player in MLB history to record 400 career home runs. That may sound like a lot, but tens of thousands of players have played in this league before. And, Cabrera is still just 32 years old.
But, this home run wasn't just a career 100th milestone dinger; it struck close to home. With his 400th home run, Cabrera is now the all-time leader among Venezuelan-born players. He surpassed the late great Andrés Galarraga who hails from the Venezuelan capital of Caracas. Galarraga finished his career with 399 home runs, but he had 1,129 more at bats than Cabrera. Cabrera also has a huge advantage in career batting average over Galarraga, .320 to .288.
Sammy Sosa has the most career home runs by any Latin American-born player in MLB history with 609. That mark is 209 home runs away, but may be reachable. If Cabrera can hit 25 home runs per season over the next eight seasons, that would give him 600 homers, putting him right in contention. MLB's all-time leader in long balls hit, Barry Bonds, stands alone at 762.
It would be really tough for Cabrera to catch that mark. If he played until he was 40 years old, Cabrera would need 363 more home runs over the next eight and half seasons. That's an average of about 42 home runs per season. Cabrera is very consistent, but he has never hit 50 home runs in a season. Although it should be mentioned Hank Aaron never hit 50 in a season either.
Just 38 games into this season, Cabrera isn't showing any signs of slowing down. Cabrera leads the entire American League with 30 runs batted in as well as on base percentage this year. Cabrera is also batting .333 at the plate, tremendously higher than Mike Trout's .291 average. Many baseball fans have argued that Trout is a superiors player, but the consistency factor heavily favors Cabrera. Cabrera currently ranks third in the AL with 10 home runs hit this year while Dominican Nelson Cruz leads all batters with 15.
Even though Cabrera surpassed Galarraga for most home runs by a Venezuelan-born player, Galarraga still has the country's lead in most runs batted in. Omar Vizquel has Venezuela's all-time lead in hits with 2,877, 645 more than Cabrera. Luis Aparicio, the only Venezuelan-born player in the Baseball Hall of Fame, has the most stolen bases, triples, plate appearances and at bats.
Still, Cabrera has the highest batting average for any Venezuelan-born player with at least 100 at bats, .320.
The Dominican Republic currently represents the most players in MLB born outside the 50 US States of America, with 83. Venezuela has the second most players in the big leagues with 65. Cuba (18) and Puerto Rico (13) rank third and fourth respectively. MLB demographics have shown that this league is more than 28 percent Latino. With Cuba and the U.S. normalizing relations, the possibilities could be endless for foreign-born Latinos in MLB.