September 14, 1999: Royals’ Mark Quinn hits two home runs in major-league debut

When two last-place teams face each other in mid-September, the stage might not seem set for great achievements, but that’s exactly what happened when the Anaheim Angels and Kansas City Royals played the second game of a doubleheader on September 14, 1999.

The Angels were wrapping up a disappointing season that had already seen their field manager, Terry Collins, resign under pressure on September 3 after a meeting with general manager Bill Bavasi.1 A month later, Bavasi himself was forced out.2 They lost 92 games and finished nine games behind the next-worst team in the American League West Division.

Kansas City was even worse. The Royals were headed for their fifth straight losing season and a franchise record-tying 97 losses. The only thing that kept them out of last place in the AL Central Division was the Minnesota Twins, who also lost 97 games and finished a half-game behind the Royals because of a rainout.

Both the Angels and Royals were in last place on September 14, and had a pair of games to play at Kansas City’s Kauffman Stadium thanks to a rainout on April 25. In the opener, the Angels overturned a five-run deficit by scoring seven runs in the final three innings against the Royals’ bullpen, whose 5.77 ERA at the end of the season trailed that of every team in the majors except the Seattle Mariners’ 5.94. Matt Luke’s two-run pinch-hit homer off Scott Service in the eighth made it a one-run game, and Tim Salmon’s three-run shot off struggling former All-Star closer Jeff Montgomery in the ninth put the Angels ahead to stay.

At designated hitter for Kansas City in the nightcap was 25-year-old Mark Quinn, making his big-league debut three days after his Triple-A Omaha Spikes were eliminated from the Pacific Coast League playoffs. Quinn, the Royals’ 11th-round selection in the June 1995 amateur draft out of Rice University, had won the PCL batting title with a .360 average, while hitting 25 homers and driving in 84 runs.

Facing the Angels was right-hander Chris Fussell. He was 0-4 for the season and was starting just the 10th game of his career. He got off to a rocky start, walking leadoff hitter Darin Erstad in the first, then committing a throwing error on a pickoff attempt that enabled Erstad to score an unearned run on Salmon’s groundout. After Anaheim starter Mike Fyhrie worked around two walks to escape the bottom of the first with no damage, Fussell gave up a leadoff homer to Troy Glaus, his 28th of the season, to extend Anaheim’s lead to 2-0.

It remained that way until the bottom of the third, when it was Anaheim’s turn to play sloppy baseball. Royals second baseman Jed Hansen, who was making the final start of his three-season major-league career, led off the inning with a groundball that was booted by Angels rookie second baseman Trent Durrington. Shortstop Ray Holbert followed with Kansas City’s first hit, a single to left field. Two batters later, AL Rookie of the Year-bound center fielder Carlos Beltrán’s groundout brought in Hansen with the Royals’ first run.

The most notable event of the fourth inning was Quinn’s first major-league hit. His first big-league plate appearance had been a pop fly to third base to end Kansas City’s threat in the first inning, but he led off the fourth with a double to left field, and though he would be stranded there, the game would have bigger things in store for Quinn in the coming innings.

Fussell continued to struggle, walking Hemphill to lead off the top of the fifth and allowing him to come around on back-to-back singles by Erstad and Garret Anderson. First baseman Mo Vaughn’s leadoff homer in the sixth – matching Glaus for the team lead with 28 – tacked on another Anaheim run.  

The score was 4-1, Anaheim, when Quinn came up in the bottom of the sixth with Jermaine Dye on first. Fyhrie was pitching a surprisingly good game up to that point. He’d surrendered only one unearned run on three hits, an unexpected result given the 5.50 ERA he carried into the game. He hadn’t pitched in nine days, but he got the Angels and interim manager Joe Maddon into the sixth inning with a lead and was throwing well.

But Quinn hooked a full-count fastball over the left-field wall, onto the grass in front of Kauffman Stadium’s waterfall.3 His first major-league homer cut Anaheim’s lead to 4-3.

The score was unchanged for the next two innings. Newly acquired reliever Dan Murray made his debut for the Royals and threw back-to-back one-two-three innings in the seventh and eighth,4 and Angels reliever Mark Petkovsek threw a scoreless seventh. For the bottom of the eighth, Maddon turned to veteran Shigetoshi Hasegawa, who soon ran into trouble, walking Dye with one out to bring up Quinn.

Postgame accounts varied on whether Hasegawa threw a slider or curve on the first pitch, but Quinn was waiting for it. “I was sitting on an off-speed pitch that first pitch and thought if he throws a curve I’m going to hit that first pitch out,” Quinn said after the game.5

That’s exactly what he did.

Quinn pulled the ball deep over the left-field wall and into the visitors bullpen for his second two-run homer of the game,6 giving the Royals a 5-4 lead and writing his name into the record books. With that swing, Quinn became just the third player since 1901 in the American or National League, and the first in over 30 years, to hit two home runs in his first major-league game. The last to do it had been another Kansas City player, Bert Campaneris of the then-Kansas City Athletics, in 1964.7

What was left of the crowd of 11,290 knew they were watching something special and called for Quinn to give them a curtain call, which he did.

“I definitely wasn’t expecting that,” Quinn said. “The coaches and some of the guys made me go back out there, so I enjoyed the moment.”8

For the Royals that happy moment wouldn’t last long. Their bullpen led the majors in blown saves and in allowing inherited runners to score. Their once-reliable closer, Montgomery, was 37 years old and having the worst season of his 13-year career, with a 6.52 ERA and 7 blown saves after the first game of the doubleheader. He retired once the season ended.

Since Montgomery was unavailable, Royals manager Tony Muser stayed with Murray to start the ninth inning, but turned to lefty Tim Byrdak after Todd Greene’s leadoff single. Byrdak, Quinn’s teammate at Rice University five years earlier, was in his first full season in the big leagues, and he’d struggled as much as the rest of Kansas City’s bullpen. He also pitched in the first game that day and entered this one with a season ERA of 8.31.

Byrdak walked the first batter he faced, Jim Edmonds. Durrington faked a bunt, then pulled back his bat and singled to center field to bring in pinch-runner Jeff DaVanon, appearing in his third big-league game, with the tying run. “What Durrington did was textbook,” said Maddon after the game. Durrington later expressed his relief.  “Something went right for me for a change,” he said.9

With the lead and save blown, Byrdak walked the Angels’ nine-hole hitter, shortstop Andy Sheets, then gave up a line-drive RBI single to Erstad that gave Anaheim a 6-5 lead. He was pulled one batter later, and José Santiago induced a groundball double play to end the inning, but the damage was done. Angels All-Star closer Troy Percival entered the game and set down the Royals to complete the doubleheader sweep.

It was a great, memorable debut for Quinn, but, unfortunately for him and the Royals, he didn’t get a chance to bat in the ninth inning and make it even more memorable.

“I’d have loved for that second one to be a game-winner, but it wasn’t,” he said. “That’s all right. I’ll deal with it. I had fun tonight. That was probably the best night of my life.”10

Six days later, on September 20, Quinn had another two-homer game, against the Seattle Mariners. He went on to hit 45 home runs in four big-league seasons, all with the Royals.

Author’s Note

One a personal note, this was a special game for more than just Quinn. It was also the first major-league game my son attended. He was not quite four years old, and I still have the ticket stub.

Acknowledgments

This article was fact-checked by Harrison Golden and copy-edited by Len Levin.

Photo credit: Mark Quinn, Trading Card Database.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org for any pertinent information, including the box score and play-by-play.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/boxes/KCA/KCA199909142.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1999/B09142KCA1999.htm

Notes

1 Mike DiGiovanna, “Collins Steps Down as Fractious Team’s Field Boss Barely Two Months after Signing Contract Extension,” Los Angeles Times, September 4, 1999: D1.

2 Mike DiGiovanna, “Angels’ Bavasi Resigns,” Los Angeles Times, October 2, 1999: D1.

3 “ANA@KC: Quinn Homers Twice in ML Debut,” MLB.com, 1:26, https://www.mlb.com/video/quinn-homers-twice-in-ml-debut-c36944973?partnerId=web_video-playback-page_video-share.

4 The Royals had acquired Murray, who made his major-league debut on August 9, by trading pitcher Glendon Rusch to the New York Mets on the day of the game.

5 Kevin Czerwinski, “The Mighty Quinn,” Ball Nine, January 9, 2023. Retrieved from https://ballnine.com/2023/01/09/the-mighty-quinn/.

6 “ANA@KC: Quinn Homers Twice in ML Debut.”

7 The three players to accomplish it before Quinn were Charlie Reilly of the American Association’s Columbus Solons in 1889, Bob Nieman of the St. Louis Browns in 1951, and Campaneris. Entering the 2026 season, it had also been done by J.P. Arencibia of the Toronto Blue Jays in 2010 and Trevor Story of the Colorado Rockies in 2016. 

8 Dick Kaegel, “Angels Sweep Royals; KC Rookie Hits Two Homers in Game,” Kansas City Star, September 15, 1999: D1, D6.

9 Mike DiGiovanna, “Angels Discover Late-Inning Magic Twice in One Day,” Los Angeles Times, September 15, 1999: D3.

10 Kaegel.