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04/15/2005 Archived Entry: "MLB news: Milestones update: 4.15.05"
By Michael Toeset
Jeff Cirillo slugged his 300th double on April 4. After Cirillo's four-year run of excellence (1998-2001), he's put up some terrible numbers. Who knows what happened to him, but he likely won't ever come close to the 53 doubles he hit in 2000.
Rafael Palmeiro moved to 20th on the all-time at-bats list on April 8. He passed Al Kaline by registering his 10117th at-bat. He's also had another 1300 walks, making that almost 11500 plate appearances. That's a lot.
Roger Clemens moved to No. 9 on the all-time wins list with a victory April 8 over the Reds - his 329th career win. His generation's Nolan Ryan, Clemens continues to pitch exceptionally well. He's probably not going to throw any no-hitters at this point in his career, but so far this season, his control has been otherworldly: 18 strikeouts and 1 walk in 14 innings. If his control stays at a Schilling-like level, watch out. Another Cy for Rocket?
Bobby Abreu hit his 300th double on April 10. Abreu's doubles best is 50, but it took him about 600 less at-bats than Cirillo to reach that milestone. And one more important thing: Abreu is still good, Cirillo is not.
Jim Edmonds connected for his 1500th hit on April 12. Edmonds has consistantly been a fantastic player, but he's never had 200 hits in a season. Mostly that's the result of various injuries; he's hit over .300 five times.
Jason Varitek hit his 100th home run on April 14. Varitek has become one of the best-hitting catchers in baseball, and the case could be made he IS the best. At any rate, Varitek probably won't add a great number of homers to his total; he's never been a huge slugger, and he's reaching the age where catchers generally lose their effectiveness (see Piazza, Mike for an example).
