Riley Greene's majestic grand slam has him closer to ending Tigers' misery

Riley Greene's third-inning grand slam Tuesday in Sacramento was one to remember – and not just because it was the first one of his Major League career.

The All-Star outfielder put the Detroit Tigers on the board in a big way against the Athletics, erasing a three-run deficit with a massive swing that sent the ball sailing over the batter's eye in center field. Projected at 471 feet, the blast is tied for the fourth-longest homer in MLB this season.

The Tigers went on to lose to the Athletics on a walk-off walk in the 10th inning. While Greene's efforts weren't enough to win the game for Detroit, his grand slam will live on in history after setting a franchise record for distance in the Statcast era (since 2015). Among all MLB grand slams, only one – Kyle Schwarber's 473-foot blast in 2019 – has been longer.

Riley Greene's majestic grand slam has him closer to ending Tigers' misery

Greene's grand slam also brought him within one RBI of reaching the 100 mark on the season – something that no Tigers player has done since Nick Castellanos drove in 101 runs in 2017.

Per Ryan Ford of the Detroit Free Press, the Tigers' 100-RBI drought is one of the longest in the league, with 27 of MLB’s 30 teams have had at least one hitter with 100 RBI in a season in the six 162-game seasons since 2017. The Miami Marlins and the San Francisco Giants are the only teams joining the Tigers without a 100-RBI hitter in that span, and the Tigers will soon thankfully fall off of that list.

Greene, for his part, appears to be heating up at just the right time as the Tigers make their final push toward the postseason. He has homered three times in his last five games, and his 32 home runs lead the Tigers while ranking fourth in the American League. Detroit's offense as a whole has been excellent, but the pitching has cost them dearly with a lack of consistency. The Tigers still have a 9.5-game lead in the division, though, so it's nice they've been able to afford such hiccups.

Greene's slam on Tuesday put him on pace for 38 homers this year, which nearly matches his total of 40 across his first three big-league seasons. The pop in his bat was never in doubt, but he's starting to prove it with more consistency this year – and he's putting the rest of the playoff field on notice.

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