ATLANTA — When Matt Olson was recently asked a second time about attending the 2000 Home Run Derby with his parents at Turner Field, Braves teammate Chris Sale quickly turned his head and said, “Wait, you were actually there?”
Sale provided this astonished response on July 6, when he and Olson gained their latest All-Star selections. Knowing that Olson was going to participate in the All-Star Game 25 years after it was last in his hometown of Atlanta was pretty cool in and of itself.
But when Ronald Acuña Jr. dropped out of the T-Mobile Home Run Derby because of a back issue last week, the story became even cooler. Suddenly, the grown version of the 6-year-old kid who had sat with his parents in left field during the 2000 Derby was given the thrill of participating in this event in his hometown for the hometown team.
“I knew there was going to be a lot of Braves people, but I kind of figured that there’d be more just baseball fans coming in, maybe from some other teams,” Olson said. “But, it felt like it was a Friday night and the division-was-on-the-line kind of game. So it was a blast.”
Olson received a rousing ovation as he and the other seven participants were announced before Monday’s event at Truist Park. But the extra adrenaline created by the hometown crowd’s support wasn’t enough. The Braves first baseman was eliminated after hitting 15 home runs in the first round.
“This is such a fun event, regardless where it is,” Olson said. “But to be able to do it in front of that crowd was incredible. I mean, you heard the chop going. Every ball that went out, they were going crazy. It was something I’ll never forget.”
Olson didn’t homer with his first nine swings and then called a timeout after he hit just four homers through the first 80 seconds of the three-minute first round. Possibly inspired by the crowd doing the Tomahawk Chop, he hit 11 more home runs over the next 100 seconds.
Olson’s farthest homer traveled a Statcast-projected 460 feet and his hardest-hit homer was 109 mph.
“Probably the loudest I’ve heard the place when I kind of got going there a little bit in the second half [of the round],” Olson said. “Ton of fun. You know, I wish I could have advanced. But I got off to a bad start.”
A Braves player has never won the Home Run Derby. But Olson can at least take solace in the fact he fared better than Chipper Jones did in 2000, when he hit just two before being eliminated in what was a different format. Jones tallied three hits, including a home run, the following night in the All-Star Game.
Many believe Acuña could have won this year’s event. But the Braves right fielder said it was more important for him to not take any chances after feeling some back discomfort after lifting weights last week.
“I feel great, but we have a goal in the second half to play great and make the playoffs,” Acuña said.
