At long last, the Cowboy is back. The holiday hiatus was nice, though.
But even as we were communing with sea turtles on the Big Island's black sand beaches, hanging out on the North Shore of O'ahu, eating shave ice and Zippy's chili, the sporting world was never far from my mind. Sure, there were the big stories that I could've been writing about, like Shaq and Kobe on Christmas Day, baseball's flurry of free agent signings and trades, the reduction of Jermaine O'Neal's suspension, or the home stretch of the NFL's regular season, but there was one thing that I just couldn't get out of my head, even in paradise.
At some point as we were driving across miles of lava fields, I began thinking about how Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, and Willie McCovey all grew up in Mobile, Alabama. Three Hall of Famers from the same town. I've always found that quite amazing. Willie McCovey had a fairly nice career, but his 521 homeruns only put him third best on his hometown list.
From there I started to wonder about other states and which players might lead their states in homeruns. A few of them came easily: Maryland (Babe Ruth) and California (Barry Bonds), for example. I guessed that Lou Gehrig probably topped the New York list and was fairly certain that Mickey Mantle led all Oklahoma natives. After that?
And what about smaller states? Benny Agbiyani came to mind quickly for Hawai'i (I'd later find he was only #2 from the Aloha state), but what about Alaska? Rhode Island? And if I researched all the states, would I come up with any leaders that I didn't recognize? (Yes, two.) What would be the smallest total?
Clearly, I had no choice but to make the list. After spending an hour or so with the good folks at ESPN.com and Baseball Reference, I had all my answers; here's the list. It's alphabetical by state, the statistics are current through the 2004 season, and the numbers in parentheses indicate the career rankings of those players in the top 100 all time. Who's leading your home state? (Oh, by the way, I also included the leaders from each of several other countries that have produced major leaguers.) Enjoy.
| State | Player | Total (Rank) |
|---|---|---|
| Alabama | Hank Aaron | 755 (1) |
| Alaska | Josh Phelps | 52 |
| Arizona | Jack Howell | 108 |
| Arkansas | Brooks Robinson | 268 |
| California | Barry Bonds | 703 (3) |
| Colorado | Johnny Frederick | 85 |
| Connecticut | Mo Vaughn | 328 (82) |
| Delaware | Randy Bush/Dave May | 96 |
| D.C. | Don Money | 176 |
| Florida | Fred McGriff | 493 (T21) |
| Georgia | Frank Thomas | 436 (31) |
| Hawai'i | Mike Lum | 90 |
| Idaho | Harmon Killebrew | 573 (8) |
| Illinois | Jim Thome | 423 (35) |
| Indiana | Gil Hodges | 370 (59) |
| Iowa | Hal Trosky | 228 |
| Kansas | Bob Horner | 218 |
| Kentucky | Jay Buhner | 310 (T93) |
| Louisiana | Mel Ott | 511 ( 18) |
| Maine | Del Bissonette | 66 |
| Maryland | Babe Ruth | 714 (2) |
| Massachusetts | Jeff Bagwell | 446 (28) |
| Michigan | Kirk Gibson/John Mayberry | 255 |
| Minnesota | Dave Winfield | 465 (25) |
| Mississippi | Ellis Burks | 352 (68) |
| Missouri | Yogi Berra | 358 (65) |
| Montana | John Lowenstein | 116 |
| Nebraska | Wade Boggs | 118 |
| Nevada | Marty Cordova | 122 |
| New Hampshire | Phil Plantier | 91 |
| New Jersey | Eric Karros | 284 |
| New Mexico | Ralph Kiner | 369 (60) |
| New York | Lou Gehrig | 493 (T21) |
| North Carolina | Mark Grace | 173 |
| North Dakota | Darin Erstad | 107 |
| Ohio | Mike Schmidt | 548 (11) |
| Oklahoma | Mickey Mantle | 536 (12) |
| Oregon | Dave Kingman | 442 (29) |
| Pennsylvania | Reggie Jackson | 563 (9) |
| Rhode Island | Gabby Hartnett | 236 |
| South Carolina | Jim Rice | 382 (T48) |
| South Dakota | Dave Collins | 32 |
| Tennessee | Vada Pinson | 256 |
| Texas | Frank Robinson | 586 (5) |
| Utah | Chad Hermansen | 13 |
| Vermont | Carlton Fisk | 376 (57) |
| Virginia | Willie Horton | 325 (83) |
| Washington | Ron Santo | 342 (72) |
| West Virginia | George Brett | 317 (90) |
| Wisconsin | Al Simmons | 307 (T96) |
| Wyoming | Mike Devereaux | 105 |
| Canada | Larry Walker | 368 (61) |
| Colombia | Edgar Renteria | 83 |
| Cuba | Rafael Palmeiro | 551 (10) |
| Curaçao | Andruw Jones | 250 |
| Domin. Rep. | Sammy Sosa | 574 (7) |
| Ireland | Jack Doyle | 26 |
| Jamaica | Chili Davis | 350 (70) |
| Japan | Hideki Matsui | 47 |
| Mexico | Vinny Castilla | 303 (100) |
| Panama | Ben Oglivie | 235 |
| Puerto Rico | Juan Gonzaléz | 434 (32) |
| Scotland | Bobby Thomson | 264 |
| Venezuela | Andres Galarraga | 399 (T39) |
By the way, if you liked that list, check out this one -- homerun leaders by letter of the alphabet.
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