How many home runs does Juan Soto have? All we need to know about slugger's new milestone that carved his name in Yankees history
On Tuesday against the Seattle Mariners, Juan Soto hit his career-high 40th home run of the season off Bryan Woo in the fourth inning, which gave the Yankees a healthy 6-1 lead in the game. New York went on to win 11-2.
The 410-foot dinger that went to left-center field stands registered many records, which are as follows:
- This was Soto's 200th home run of his career.
- The Yankees slugger at 25 years and 328 days became the seventh youngest hitter in MLB history to reach 200 home runs before his 26th birthday. The other members on the list include Jimmie Foxx (222), Eddie Mathews (222), Alex Rodriguez (216), Mel Ott (211), Mickey Mantle (207) and Albert Pujols (200).
- The two-run home run marked his first home run in T-Mobile Park. He joins the exclusive list of active players to have hit a home run in all 30 active MLB parks.
- Along with Aaron Judge's 53 home runs, they became only the third Yankees pair to have hit 40 home runs each in a season. Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig (1927, ’30, ‘31) and Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris (1961) were the first two.
Juan Soto's career peak is coming at the right time, as he looks forward to earning a big paycheck once the season concludes. He will hit free agency this offseason and could potentially sign the biggest contract in MLB history, even surpassing Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani's 10-year, $700 million contract last offseason.
Juan Soto and Aaron Judge help Yankees crush Mariners 11-2
The Yankees offense was all over the Seattle Mariners, with multiple innings where they scored more than one run. Aaron Judge brought in the first two runs of the game with a two-run RBI double to left field in the first inning. He drove in two more runs in his next plate appearance in the second inning.
The Mariners got back one with a home run from Jorge Polanco off Luis Gil, cutting the deficit to 4-1 by the end of the second inning. Then, of course, followed a two-run homer in the fourth for Soto.
The runs kept on coming in as the Mariners bullpen was also not able to keep the Yankees hitters calm, who scored 11 runs on the night while only giving up two.
With the win, the Yankees improved to 88-63, extending their lead over the Baltimore Orioles to 4.0 games for the AL East division lead.