Grotewold Pinches His Way to a Record

This Week in Baseball, by Philadelphia third-string catcher (or, if you prefer, third-string first baseman) Jeff Grotewold:

Monday, pinch-hit home run.

Tuesday, pinch-hit home run.

Wednesday, pinch-hit home run, then dinner with wife and all of their good friends from the University of San Diego.

Grotewold has had a year in a week, but it ended Thursday not with another big bang, but with a whimper. Grotewold, who played for and graduated from USD in 1986, watched Philadelphia’s entire 3-1 loss to the Padres from the Phillie dugout.

It was probably good he didn’t play, because it takes nearly an entire day to sort through his three-day binge.

Research by Robert McConnell, home run expert for the Society of American Baseball Research, found that Grotewold was the first player in major league history to hit pinch-homers on three consecutive days.

“Really?” Grotewold said. “If that’s the case, it’s nice to be the first one to do it. Get my name somewhere in the record books.”

The pinch-homers all came in San Francisco. Monday’s was against Bud Black, and it was Grotewold’s first major league homer. Tuesday’s was off Mike Jackson, and Wednesday’s was against John Burkett. The three homers came in four at-bats; the Tuesday homer was in the second game of a double-header. During a pinch-hit appearance in the first game of the doubleheader, he grounded to second.

The only problem was, the Phillies lost all four games in San Francisco, and things have been gloomy all week. The Phillies have now lost nine of 11 and are only 2-8 on their current West Coast trip.

“It’s nice to be successful pinch-hitting, but in the end, we’re losing,” Grotewold said. “I’d trade any one of those home runs for a win, the way we’re scuffling.”

Grotewold, who had never appeared in a major league game until this season, was called up from triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre during the first week of the season, shipped back in mid-May and then recalled toward the end of May.

In 27 at-bats, Grotewold, 26, is batting .296 with three homers and five RBIs. His best credentials, though, may be in the confidence department.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said. “The plate is only so wide. The ball has to go over it sometime or another. To be truthfully honest, I’ve never looked at a face on the mound.

“And I probably never will.”

While nobody has ever hit three pinch-homers in three days, two players hold the major league record for three pinch-homers in three at-bats: Los Angeles’ Lee Lacy, who did it over a 16-day span in 1978; and Philadelphia’s Del Unser, who did it over 11 days in 1979.

As for pinch homers in a season, Johnny Frederick of the 1932 Brooklyn Dodgers holds the record with six. But Grotewold does lead the majors with three pinch homers this season.

“I owe most of the credit to the coaches who throw extra hitting every day,” Grotewold said. “If I didn’t have them, I’d be lost.”

Instead, only the baseballs have been lost.

“It was incredible to see,” said Denis Menke, a Phillie coach. “And he hit them about the same place, too.”

But there have been no Superman jokes in the Phillie clubhouse, and no comparisons to Babe Ruth.

“None,” Grotewold said. “It has not been a great road trip for us. The humor and laughter have been down.

“The only thing that will pick us up is if we get a win. My home runs are meaningless unless we get a win.”