Out of all the great slugging displays in major-league history, Sammy Sosa now stands alone.
Sosa belted his 19th home run of June Thursday night before 30,688 at venerable Tiger Stadium, breaking the 61-year-old record for most home runs in a month set by Detroit’s Rudy York.
But Sosa’s record meant absolutely nothing for the puzzling Cubs, who watched their bullpen crumble again in a 6-4 loss to The Tigers.
Tony Clark cranked a 450-foot, three-run center-field home run off Terry Mulholland in the seventh to snap a 3-3 tied, spoiling Sosa’s big day and handing the Cubs their fifth straight loss and 12th in their last 16 games.
Sosa stroked an opposite-field home run to right leading off the Cubs’ seventh against Brian Moehler, surpassing York’s 18 home runs in August of 1937. Sosa knew it was gone immediately, and leaped into the air as the ball carried into the sky at Tiger Stadium. He pointed at the heavens as he reached home plate, and received a curtain call from appreciative Tigers fans.
Will Sosa’s record ever be broken?
“I don’t know,” Sosa said. “Maybe 10, 20 years from now there could be another Sammy Sosa. I’m there at the right time. In ’37, the guy who broke the record was `the Man.’ Tomorrow there could be another guy.”
It was Sosa’s 32nd home run, maintaining his pace to beat Roger Maris’ alltime home-run record of 61 and keeping him three homers behind major-league leader Mark McGwire, who also homered on Thursday. Sosa has 23 home runs and 45 RBIs in his last 26 games, and is on track to hit 66 home runs for the season.
The second-largest crowd at Tiger Stadium this year, many of whom turned out to see Cubs phenom Kerry Wood, nearly doubled the Tigers’ regular-season average of 15,648.
Pitching in 94-degree heat, Wood struck out eight and allowed three runs on four hits in six innings, walking five along the way. The game was tied at 3-3 when Wood was told he would not start the seventh because his pitch count had reached 105.
“I felt like if I sent him out, if someone got on, I’d have to take him out,” manager Jim Riggleman said. “I’m generally going to pull him when he’s in the 110-pitch range. . . . To a lot of people’s ire, I’m really going to monitor how many innings and pitches he’ll throw.”
“I went out and did my job,” Wood said. “I didn’t feel I had great stuff, but I had good enough stuff to get by.”
After Wood was removed, the Tigers took control. Terry Adams (6-5) walked two of the first three hitters he faced, earning a quick hook. Mulholland induced Bobby Higginson to hit into a force play for the second out. But Riggleman had no one warming up and left Mulholland in to face the right-handed Clark, who made the most of a favorable matchup by taking Mulholland ultra-deep.
Mickey Morandini poked a solo homer in the eighth to make it 6-4, but that was it for the Cubs’ schizophrenic offense.
Henry Rodriguez staked Wood to a 1-0 lead in the second, hitting home run No. 17–the 100th of his career–off the facade of the upper deck in right. Rodriguez barely missed hitting it over the roof and out onto Trumbull Avenue. It was the fourth straight game in which Rodriguez has homered, leaving him one shy of the Cubs consecutive-game record of five, which is held by Hack Wilson, Ryne Sandberg and Sosa, who tied it June 8.
Damion Easley tied it with his 18th home run in the Tigers’ fourth, blasting one into the upper deck in left off Wood. The Tigers took a 3-1 lead in the sixth on a two-out, two-run double by Geronimo Berroa that bounced off the mitt of a diving Brant Brown, who injured his left shoulder and may be out two weeks.
Moehler, who came in with a 7-0 record and 1.93 earned-run average at Tiger Stadium, muffled the Cub bats until Sosa led off the seventh with his record-busting clout. Jeff Blauser tied it up later that inning with a sacrifice fly off rookie Matt Anderson, who made his major-league debut.
But the Cubs bullpen blew it again, a recurring theme of late. Riggleman foresees no changes on tap.
“I don’t really see what we can do,” he said. “I don’t see a situation where we’ll bring anyone up to change the makeup of the bullpen.”
The Cubs are 11-12 in June, a month that will always be remembered for Sosa’s unprecedented power display.
“I’m real happy my name is in the record book,” Sosa said. “But to me it means nothing because we lost.”
