This quiz is about players with a connection to another player. There are two lists of players with each player in the first list matching a player in the second. Your job is to figure out the connection.
Congratulations to No Statistician But! He knew that the matching players were teammates in a season when both (or all) hit their 300th home runs. Those details are after the jump.
Here are the two lists. Every name in list A matches one in list B, except for one list A name that matches two in list B. The two lists comprise all of the players with the connection, so there are no other players that could be added to either list.
So what connects the players in this quiz?
| Player List A | Player List B | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Moises Alou | Edwin Encarnacion |
| 2 | Jose Bautista | Steve Finley |
| 3 | Lance Berkman | Shawn Green |
| 4 | Jermaine Dye | Paul Konerko |
| 5 | Troy Glaus | Carlos Lee |
| 6 | Luis Gonzalez | Derrek Lee |
| 7 | Ron Santo | Albert Pujols |
| 8 | Alfonso Soriano | Ivan Rodriguez |
| 9 | Billy Williams |
Clue: Larry Walker and Ron Gant came close to being another match.
Bautista and Encarnacion this season became the 7th set of teammates to accomplish this feat in just 12 years, after happening only once in the 71 prior seasons back to 1934 when Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig became the first set of teammates (and first two players on any team) to both reach 300 career home runs.
The other matching teammates are:
- Santo/Williams – 1971 Cubs
- Gonzalez/Green – 2005 D-Backs
- Alou/Finley – 2006 Giants
- Glaus/Pujols – 2008 Cardinals
- Berkman/C. Lee/I-Rod – 2009 Astros
- Dye/Konerko – 2009 White Sox
- Soriano/D. Lee – 2010 Cubs
The clue of Larry Walker and Ron Gant almost doing this refers to both of them hitting number 300 for the 2001 Rockies, but Walker doing so after Gant had moved on to play for the A’s.
Jermaine Dye and Paul Konerko hit their 300th home runs back-to-back leading off the second inning of Chicago’s 10-6 win over the Tigers on Apr 13, 2009. Three years later, Konerko and teammate Adam Dunn would both hit their 400th home runs.
The 2009 Astros became the only team to have three players reach this milestone together when Lance Berkman, Carlos Lee and Ivan Rodiguez all hit their 300th home runs before I-Rod was traded to the Rangers on August 18th.
