Last night Oakland Athletics outfielder Yoenis Cespedes won the MLB Home Derby for the second year in a row, a feat that has not been accomplished in 15 years.
Cespedes finished the night with a total of 30 home runs. In the final round, he beat Cincinnati Reds’ Todd Frazier 9-1. It was the largest margin of victory for a final round in the Derby.
“I’m somebody who’s very conscious of the power that I have,” Cespedes said through a translator. “So I don’t need to put more of a swing or more of an effort in order to hit a home run. I just have to look for a good pitch and put a good swing on it, and it usually takes care of it.”
In the first round, Jose Bautista of the Toronto Blue Jays led the American League with 10 homers and Giancarlo Stanton of the Miami Marlins led the National League with 6. Under the Derby’s new rules, both players were able to sail on to the third round without having to compete in the second round. However, the two players ended up not faring so well in the third round, with Bautista only hitting 4 homers and Stanton failing to hit any.
Stanton did however have a very impressive hit during his final out of the first round when he sent the ball soaring for about 510 feet. It landed near the top of the upper deck at Target Field.
L.A. Dodgers’ Yasiel Puig was the only one out of the ten participants to hit zero home runs. It was the first time a contestant was homer-less since 2008, when Robinson Cano did not hit any ball over the wall in Kansas City.
Overall, the American League crushed the National League in home runs 54 to 24. The two will face each other tonight for the All-Star Game, airing at 7pm CST on FOX.
