Major League history was made Tuesday. Obscure history, but history nonetheless. A Modern Era (since 1900) record 12 teams scored 10-plus runs Tuesday, including a Modern Era record four games in which both teams scored double digits.
The previous Modern Era record was nine teams with 10-plus runs on Aug. 23, 1998, and July 7, 2004. Thirteen teams scored 10-plus runs on July 4, 1894, and 12 teams did it on May 30, 1884. However, that was long before the American League and National League merged to form what is now Major League Baseball.
Prior to Tuesday, the only other days with four games in which both teams scored 10-plus runs were July 4 and July 9 in 1894. The previous Modern Era record was three games in which both teams scored 10-plus runs on May 17, 1996, and May 5, 2000. Here are Tuesday's high-scoring games:
- Minnesota Twins 10, Seattle Mariners 3 (box score)
- San Francisco Giants 11, Cincinnati Reds 10 (box score)
- Los Angeles Dodgers 10, Baltimore Orioles 3 (box score)
- Cleveland Guardians 10, Pittsburgh Pirates 1 (box score)
- New York Mets 11, Chicago White Sox 10 (box score)
- Arizona Diamondbacks 16, Atlanta Braves 13 (box score)
- Chicago Cubs 17, Washington Nationals 3 (box score)
- Kansas City Royals 11, Detroit Tigers 10 (box score)
The San Diego Padres almost made it 13 teams with at least 10 runs. They settled for a 9-1 win over the Toronto Blue Jays (box score).
That D-Backs vs. Braves game was one of the season's most exciting games. The two teams combined for 12 runs in the first inning and a half, with seven lead changes in the nine innings. The top four hitters in Arizona's lineup -- Geraldo Perdomo, Ketel Marte, Corbin Carroll, Christian Walker -- went a combined 10 for 21 with three doubles, a triple, two homers, and 12 RBI.
Offense is up this year -- teams are averaging 4.58 runs per game, the highest rate in a 162-game season since 2019 (4.83) -- but until this becomes a pattern and we see high-scoring games night after night, there's no reason to think Tuesday is anything more than an anomaly. Sometimes weird things happen in baseball, and you wind up with a whole bunch of slugfests on the same night.
The combined highest-scoring day in MLB history is 222 runs scored on June 10, 1962. A total of 199 runs were scored Tuesday. MLB's last 200-run day was July 1, 2021.
