Tyler O’Neill did it again.
O’Neill, now with the Baltimore Orioles, hit yet another home run on Opening Day on Thursday. It marked his sixth straight Opening Day with a home run, which is the longest such streak in MLB history.
In the third inning of the Orioles’ matchup with the Toronto Blue Jays, O’Neill drilled a deep shot over the right-field wall at Rogers Centre off starter José Berrios. That three-run dinger put the Orioles up 5-0. Baltimore cruised to a 12-2 victory as O’Neill finished 3-for-3 and catcher Adley Rutschman went 3-of-5 with 3 RBI and two homers.
Advertisement
Advertisement
The Orioles crushed Blue Jays pitching Thursday with 14 hits, six of them homers.
O’Neill, who spent his first six seasons in the league with the St. Louis Cardinals before last year’s stint with the Boston Red Sox, signed a three-year, $49.5 million deal with Baltimore this past offseason. His Opening Day home run streak dates to 2020, when he hit a homer off Pittsburgh’s Joe Musgrove.
The streak includes homering twice on Opening Day against the Blue Jays — and he revealed after last year’s homer that he knows exactly where he stands with this unique record.
“I knew what was going on, for sure. … You always want to kick the season off with a bang,” O’Neill said. “Fortunately, I’ve been able to do it [five] times in a row now. Just having a lot of fun out there.”
O’Neill broke the record with last year’s home run. Todd Hundley, Gary Carter and Yogi Berra are tied for second on the all-time list with four straight Opening Day home runs each. Hundley was the most recent to do that when he pulled it off from 1994 to ’97.
Advertisement
Advertisement
O’Neill, 29, had 31 home runs and 61 RBI on 99 hits last season with the Red Sox. It marked just his second season in which he played at least 100 games. Boston went 81-81 and missed the playoffs for a third straight campaign.
At this point, it wouldn’t be Opening Day without an O’Neill home run. Given how long this streak has been going for and the fact that O’Neill is the first person to touch that record in nearly three decades, how long his record will stand is anybody’s guess.
