If you are asked what would be the most exciting plays or occurrences in an MLB game, what would you say?
The answers will obviously differ a lot, because people have different interests and tastes.
Younger audiences, and some recently-converted old-schoolers, have come to worship the bat flip.
It’s the culmination of a perfect home run swing, a show of swagger and even some cockiness that gives the game a newfound fun element.
When it comes to bat flips, we have seen some really cool ones in recent memory.
We have Yoenis Cespedes‘ one with the New York Mets in 2015, Rhys Hoskins‘ this past postseason, and Oswaldo Cabrera‘s against the Cleveland Guardians.
However, to this day, no one can top Jose Bautista‘s in the 2015 American League Division Series between the Toronto Blue Jays and the Texas Rangers.
It came in the win-or-go-home Game 5 of the series.
Bautista, one of MLB’s best hitters around those days, broke a 3-3 tie in the seventh inning with a three-run blast that left the yard in a hurry.
There is only one correct answer for best bat flip in baseball history. 😤 pic.twitter.com/9U9pLauUVY
— MLB (@MLB) January 23, 2023
Rogers Centre predictably erupted, as the home run put the Jays in the driver’s seat to win the series.
Bautista’s image flinging his bat aside before starting his home run trot still lives in Jays (and Rangers) fans’ minds.
The Rangers didn’t like the bat flip and it actually was a factor in Bautista’s legendary fight with Rougned Odor the following year.
The Blue Jays would lose to the Kansas City Royals in the 2015 Championship Series, but Bautista gifted fans with MLB’s premier bat flip a round before.
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