Ohtani hits 100th home run for Dodgers

(AFP) With the hardest hit of his career, Japanese star Shohei Ohtani reached the hundredth home run mark with the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday in a 9x7 loss at the Pittsburgh Pirates.

Ohtani reached that mark in his first 294 games with the Los Angeles franchise, which he joined last season and led to the World Series title.

The 31-year-old Japanese is the third fastest player to reach 100 homers with a team, behind only Mark McGwire (230 games with the Cardinals) and Babe Ruth (250 with the Yankees).

Ohtani joined that club during the third inning of the game at PNC Park, when he connected with a missile that left the bat at 193 kilometers per hour.

This is the highest speed he has reached in the majors, where the record since there are records is held precisely by one of his opponents on Tuesday, the Dominican Oneil Cruz, with the 198 km/h that he achieved last May 25.

This Tuesday Cruz pushed in a run for the Pirates and got a base on balls in his only at-bat.

After Ohtani's, Cuban Andy Pages hit another homer to tie the Dodgers at four runs, but the hosts relied on Jared Triolo, who drove in two runs on two hits, to seal the win in the first game of the series.

Another star of the day was 22-year-old Dominican Junior Caminero, who hit his 40th homer of the season and drove in four runs in the Tampa Bay Rays 6x5 win over the Seattle Mariners.

Panama's Iván Herrera also gave the St. Louis Cardinals a 2x1 victory over the Oakland Athletics with a two-run home run in the sixth inning.

In their turn the New York Mets defeated the Detroit Tigers 12x5 with two home runs by Pete Alonso and another by Juan Soto.

The Dominican has now hit homers in four of his last five games, including his mammoth grand slam Monday also against the Tigers.