Dazzling Debuts: First At-Bat Home Runs

Every baseball player experiences a series of firsts when they step onto the field: the nervous excitement of entering the locker room, the pride of putting on the team uniform, the awe-inspiring moment of exiting the dugout and crossing the white lines. But when a player walks up to the plate and hits a home run in his first major-league at-bat, he creates a wave of excitement among the fans, achieves a rare feat for the record books — and experiences the thrill of a lifetime in his professional career.

Dazzling Debuts: First At-Bat Home Runs is a celebration of these unforgettable moments, a tribute to the players who swung for the fences and, against the odds, connected with destiny. From the earliest days of the game to the modern era, the lore of the first at-bat home run has captivated fans and players alike. Through the end of 2024, the number of major-league first at-bat home runs stands at 141 — from George Tebeau of the Cincinnati Red Stockings and Mike Griffin of the Baltimore Orioles on Opening Day 1887 to Jhonkensy Noel of the Cleveland Guardians.

This special Featured Spotlight web project at SABR.org complements our new Digital Library book, edited by Giselle Stancic, Bill Nowlin, and Jacob Pomrenke, which highlights a player from all 30 current Major League Baseball franchises. On the following pages, you can discover 60 SABR biographies, more than 50 thrilling game recaps with play-by-play accounts, photographs and videos of their memorable swings, and exclusive oral history audio interviews of players reliving their first at-bat homers in their own words — including Ed Sanicki (1949), Cuno Barragan (1961), Al Woods (1977), Dave Machemer (1978), Jon Nunnally (1995), and Daniel Nava (2010).

Dazzling Debuts also celebrates the global reach of baseball, and with the generous assistance from our colleagues in SABR chapters worldwide, we’re honored to include players who hit first at-bat home runs in Japan, Korea, Puerto Rico, and Mexico. We welcome further information from countries such as the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, and other baseball leagues. These records, and the diligence it takes to preserve them, illustrate the universal appeal of a first at-bat home run and the shared thrill of achieving this remarkable event.

In addition, with research support from our colleagues at the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Players Association, we explored the records for first at-bat home runs in the AAGPBL. While we did not locate a documented example, we have included an article about on-the-field innovations adopted by the AAGPBL to encourage more home-run hitting during the league’s tenure (1943 to 1954), to better showcase the power and athleticism of women baseball players.

The Dazzling Debuts project team extends our deepest gratitude to the authors, editors, players, and research colleagues who shared their expertise and passion for baseball to make this work possible. We hope you enjoy learning more about first at-bat home runs!

— Giselle Stancic