Another Milestone

When I was writing about the Red Sox sell-out streak last night, I hadn't realized that there was another momentous number hanging in the air, as well. It turns out that the 250,000th home run was hit in the Tigers/A's game by Gary Sheffield off of Gio Gonzales. Sean Forman was keeping the watch in the comments to this post. I haven't seen any indication that Sheffield was aware that the milestone number was coming up, but it sure looks like he wanted it. He hit number 249,999, too. He may not have been satisfied with that solo shot, though, because number 250,000 was, appropriately enough, a grand slam. That's the way to commemorate this kind of achievement. And Sheffield has another number to keep an eye out for, one that he no doubt has been aware of for longer than that 250,000 number. Last night's second home run was his personal 496th shot. On the Red Sox front, Jason Bay hit home run number 249,997, so he was certainly in the hunt, it wasn't quite close enough.