New York – Kyle Higashioka called him a “beer league softball homer.” But it counted in the big leagues and it was good for a small piece of statcast history.
In the eighth inning of Sunday’s 18-4 defeat of the Yankees at Yankee Stadium, on the 35.1 mph pitch of the Cubs’ first baseman-turn-pitcher Frank Schwindel, Higashioka marked the slowest pitch tracked by Statcast for a home run.
“It was a lot of fun,” Higashioka said. “Someone once told me that the key to hitting a counterfeit ball is, ‘Stay back, stay back, stay back.’ So that’s what I was trying to do there. I saw it coming in and thought, ‘Yeah, I can kill it.’
Higashiyoka’s Homer replaces the previous record holder for the slowest Homer pitch – the 43.9 mph offer from Reyes Brett Phillips, which Sheldon News dropped on the wall at Tropicana Field on April 11 this season.
The blast was Higashioka’s second game after reliever Daniel Norris hit a single shot in the third inning and received silent treatment from his Yankees teammates.
After he scored seven runs to lead the Majors during spring training, Higashioka had his first match of the regular season.
Higashiyo said, “I thought that whenever I hit home runs, a lot of time goes by, they will definitely treat me silently.” “I really expected that.”
Higashioka credited fellow Yankees catcher Jose Trevino for advising before the bat; Trevino noticed that Higashioka did not look aggressive with his lower half in the first bat of the game.
“I’ve been drinking all year, trying to find an adjustment to get back to where I could be,” Higashioka said. “For some reason, [on Trevino’s advice] everything clicked in place. I want to give credit to my man Trevi. “
