Chicago Cubs outfielder Ian Happ hasn’t exactly been lighting the world on fire of late, but he certainly put a charge into a ball in the sixth inning of Monday’s game against the Washington Nationals.
Happ, who hadn’t hit a home run since hitting two against the St. Louis Cardinals in London on June 24, stepped to the plate with Seiya Suzuki on base in the sixth inning and lashed a Mackenzie Gore offering over the left field basket to cut Washington’s lead to 5-3:
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The home run was impressive in a lot of ways, but there were two that stood out. The exit velocity on the home run, according to Statcast, was 112.6 miles per hour, making it not only Happ’s hardest-hit ball of the season, but also the hardest-hit home run of his career.
To make things even stranger, Wrigley Field is the only stadium in Major League Baseball where the line drive would have gotten out for a home run, according to Statcast.
Despite its place as his hardest-hit home run, it wasn’t the hardest-hit ball of his career. That honor goes to a single that he mashed off of Erasmo Ramirez in July 2017 that left the bat at 114.2 miles per hour. Just four days prior to that, he hit a double with an exit velocity of 114.1 miles per hour, the second-hardest of his career.