On This Date
Aug. 7
1907: Walter Johnson won the first of his 417 victories, leading the Washington Senators past the Cleveland Indians, 7-2.
1922: Ken Williams of the St. Louis Browns hit two home runs in the sixth inning of rout over the Washington Senators.
1923: Cleveland’s Frank Bower went 6-for-6 with a double and five singles as the Indians routed the Washington Senators, 22-2.
1956: The largest crowd in minor league history, 57,000, saw 50-year-old Satchel Paige of Miami beat Columbus in an International League game at the Orange Bowl.
1963: Jim Hickman of the New York Mets hit for the cycle in a 7-3 win over the St. Louis Cardinals at the Polo Grounds. Hickman’s cycle came in single-double-triple-homer order.
1985: The strike by the Major League Baseball Players Association ended with the announcement of a tentative agreement. The season resumed Aug. 8.
1999: Wade Boggs became the first player to homer for his 3,000th hit, with a two-run shot in Tampa Bay’s 15-10 loss to Cleveland. Boggs already had a pair of RBI singles when he homered off Chris Haney in the sixth inning.
2004: Greg Maddux became the 22nd pitcher in major league history to reach 300 victories, leading the Chicago Cubs to an 8-4 victory over San Francisco.
2007: San Francisco’s Barry Bonds hit home run No. 756 to break Hank Aaron’s storied record with one out in the fifth inning, hitting a full-count, 84 mph fastball from Washington’s Mike Bacsik. Noticeably absent were Commissioner Bud Selig and Aaron. The Nationals won 8-6.
2016: Ichiro Suzuki tripled off the wall for his 3,000th hit in the major leagues, becoming the 30th player to reach the milestone as the Miami Marlins beat the Colorado Rockies, 10-7.
2016: Manny Machado became the second player in major league history to homer in the first, second and third innings, driving in a career-high seven runs in a 10-2 victory over Chicago.
2018: Bartolo Colon of Texas became the winningest pitcher from Latin America in the Rangers’ 11-4 victory over the Seattle Mariners. After six tries, the 45-year-old right-hander got his 246th career victory and finally broke the tie with Nicaragua’s Dennis Martinez. Colon gave up four runs and eight hits in seven innings and improved his record to 6-10.
2021: Host nation Japan wins its first ever gold medal in Olympic baseball by defeating the United States, 2-0.