Washington Nationals shortstop Trea Turner is one of the fastest players in Major League Baseball, and sometimes his speed just seems unreal.
According to Statcast’s Sprint Speed metric, Turner is tied for the third-fastest baserunner in the 2020 season with St. Louis Cardinals center fielder Harrison Bader at 30.1 feet per second. So it’s actually kind of surprising that Turner didn’t hit his first inside-the-park home run until Thursday, per NBC Sports Washington.
Down 2-0 in the third to the Philadelphia Phillies, 27-year-old Turner — who has an MLB-leading .366 batting average — hit a 402-foot shot to center field off a sinker from pitcher Zach Eflin.
It bounced hard off the wall and went flying in the opposite direction, giving Turner more than enough time to round the bases for an inside-the-park home run.
🚨 Trea Turner inside-the-parker 🚨 pic.twitter.com/ZhaBFGWiRR
— MLB (@MLB) September 3, 2020
Here’s a look at Turner flying around the bases:
Trea “The Burner” Turner. pic.twitter.com/a85m7zTK7j
— MLB (@MLB) September 3, 2020
As MLB.com noted, because the ball had a 103.1-mile per hour exit velocity and a 25-degree launch angle, it would have cleared the fence at 17 of 30 MLB ballparks. More from MLB.com:
“I hit it good,” Turner said. “[I] felt like I had a chance at a homer, but he ran after it pretty hard, so I felt like he was going to run it down. He’s got a bunch of speed out there. I was just keeping my eyes on the ball, and then once I saw it hit and kick pretty far, I knew I had a shot. …
“Even around second base, I was still watching the ball and I felt like I had a shot and I was going to go, kind of regardless if [third-base coach] Chip [Hale] sent me or not, and then I saw him waving me, so I just continued through.”
The Nationals lost to the Phillies, 6-5, in 10 innings.
