It’s time to revisit the Braves’ chase for the Major League Baseball single-season home run record.
After the Braves hit three home runs in Tuesday’s 7-6 victory over the Phillies, they own the National League record, which now stands at 281 and growing. The Dodgers owned the previous league record of 279 set in 2019. Matt Olson tied the mark with his home run in the fourth inning. It was also his 51st homer of the season, that ties the single-season franchise record, but you know all about that. Ronald Acuña Jr. and Marcell Ozuna homered in the fifth inning to give the Braves the record plus one.
The Braves hit their 281 home runs in 145 games. That’s an average of 1.94 homers per game.
Next up, again as we have previously documented, is the MLB record of 307 set by the Twins in 2019. The Braves need 26 home runs to tie and 27 home runs to break the record over their final 17 regular-season games. They would need to average 1.59 homers per game the rest of the way to break the record.
The Braves currently have the fourth highest single-season home run total behind those 2019 Twins, the 2019 Yankees (306) and the 2019 Astros (288). There were a lot of home runs hit in 2019.
The 2023 Braves and the 2019 Twins have one thing in common – Eddie Rosario. He has 21 home runs for the Braves this season. He hit 32 for the Twins that season. Ehire Adrianza, without a homer and currently on the 60-day injured list for the Braves, was also on that Twins team and had five homers.
2023 Braves
Matt Olson – 51
Ronald Acuña Jr. – 37
Marcell Ozuna – 34
Austin Riley – 34
Ozzie Albies – 29
Eddie Rosario – 21
Sean Murphy – 20
Orlando Arcia – 17
Michael Harris II – 16
Travis d’Arnuad – 11
Kevin Pillar – 7
Sam Hilliard – 3
Nicky Lopez – 1
2019 Twins
Nelson Cruz – 41
Max Kepler – 36
Miguel Sano – 34
Eddie Rosario – 32
Mitch Garver – 31
C.J. Cron – 25
Jonathan Schoop – 23
Jorge Palanco – 22
Marwin Gonzalez – 15
Jason Castro – 13
Byron Buxton – 10
Jake Cave – 8
Ehire Adrianza – 5
Luis Arraez – 4
Willians Astudillo – 3
LaMonte Wade Jr. – 2
Ryan LaMarre - 2
