It Was A Magical Night For Former UVA Star Mark Reynolds

At the beginning of the Major League Baseball season, Mark Reynolds didn’t even have a team. Eight weeks ago today, he was called up from the minors to play his first game of the season for the Washington Nationals.

Last night he made history.

The former UVA star went 5 for 5 last night against the Miami Marlins including 2 home runs, two singles and a double while driving in 10 runs. That not only tied the Nationals’ team record for RBI in a game (with Anthony Rendon) but put him in elite company as he became only the 15^th player in MLB history to drive in 10 runs in a game.

When you combine the 10 RBI with going 5-for-5 in the game, the feat becomes even rarer. According to ESPN Stats and Info, only 4 players have accomplished the combination in the history of the game. Three of those occurrences have happened in the last two years. Between 1920 and 2016, it only happened once.

Reynolds has had a solid 10-year major league career after playing shortstop for three years for UVA from 2002 to 2004. A native of Pikeville, Kentucky who grew up in Virginia Beach and played high school baseball at First Colonial, Reynolds led UVA in home runs in 2002 with 15, RBI in 2003 with 46 and had 35 career home run during his time in Charlottesville.

He was drafted by the Arizona Diamondbacks in the 16^th round in 2004, spent three years in the minors, then made his Major League debut on May 16, 2007 for the Diamondbacks against the Colorado Rockies. He was immediately impressive, driving in 14 runs in his first 15 MLB games. He would go on to play for 7 different MLB teams through last season, with the high-water mark being 2009 in Arizona. He hit 44 home runs that season and finished 20^th in the balloting for Most Valuable Player.

But after last season with the Colorado Rockies, the Rockies showed little to no interest in re-signing the 34-year-old. Reynolds had hit 30 home runs with a solid .267 batting average in 2017, but when the 2018 MLB season started, he was a man without a team. It wasn’t until April 12, just shy of three months ago, that the Nationals signed him to a minor league contract. Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo knew Reynolds well, as he was the man who drafted Reynolds in 2004 when he was with Arizona.

Reynolds stayed in the minors until the Nationals selected his contract on May 12 due to fellow Wahoo Ryan Zimmerman suffering an oblique strain. Both Zimmerman and Reynolds were teammates at UVA, and they both at one time played shortstop, with Zimmerman being moved to third for the Cavaliers to get both on the field together.

Reynolds’ return to the majors was May 13 for the Nationals, ironically against the team that drafted him, Arizona. He had a magical night, hitting two home runs, including one in the 8^th inning of a tie game to help the Nats win 6-4. Reynolds would start out on a torrid hitting pace back in May before cooling off in June.

Then he exploded again. The Nationals had not been playing well of late, dropping to under .500 before coming into Thursday’s game against the Marlins. To further aggravate an already annoyed fanbase, they fell behind 9-0 before rallying to win 14-12. Friday night they struggled, going into the bottom of the ninth tied 2-2. Reynolds was called to pinch-hit, and his walkoff home run started his flare for the dramatic which continued into last night’s game.

Adding the pinch-hit homer to his stats produces these numbers for his last six at-bats: 6-for-6 including 3 home runs, a double, two singles and 11 runs batted in. That’s a month of RBI for some players.

In only 37 games this season for the Nationals, he has career-highs in batting average (.292), on base percentage (.358), slugging percentage (.594), and on-base plus slugging percentage (.953).

And there’s still almost three more months of baseball to play.