Ichiro Collects 4,000th Career Hit

Ichiro Suzuki gets his 4,000th hit
Ichiro Suzuki gets his 4,000th hit
Aug 21 2013 Bronx NY USA New York Yankees right fielder Ichiro Suzuki 31 acknowledges the crowd after recording his 4000th career hit during the first inning against the Toronto Blue Jays at Yankee Stadium Debby Wong USA TODAY Sports

Much of the talk in baseball lately has focused on PEDs and the Biogenesis scandal that has rocked the sport yet again. On Wednesday night, however, that took a back seat as Yankees outfielder Ichiro Suzuki collected his 4,000th career hit.

In the first inning against the Toronto Blue Jays, Ichiro hit a single off of starter R.A. Dickey for the historic mark. The game was stopped as he was recognized and greeted by teammates.

At this point, there’s little argument that Ichiro is one of the greatest hitters the game has ever seen. There would be widespread debate had the outfielder accumulated all of his hits in Japanese baseball. With 2,722 career hits in Major League Baseball and fewer than half that in in the Japanese Pacific League where he began his career, though, there’s no question that Ichiro would be a superstar no matter where he played.

Next up for Ichiro is Pete Rose‘s 4,256 career mark. At 40, he is slowing down, obviously. Still, he has already managed 115 hits this season and another 256 isn’t too unrealistic if he plays two more years.

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Anson Whaley
Anson Whaley is a freelance writer with more than 16 years of experience. He is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh and a current member of the Football Writers Association of America (FWAA) and the U.S. Basketball Writers Association (USBWA). Mr. Whaley has also been a credentialed member of the media for various events. !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?'http':'https';if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+'://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, 'script', 'twitter-wjs');