As a kid that could tick off batting averages for both lineups in most games I attended as a young Cubs fan in the mid-70’s, I appreciate simple baseball stats. However, randomly selected numbers for meaningless narratives are less my thing. like passionate baseball fan, Shakira, I believe that the hips don’t lie.

In today’s Cubs notes, the writer points out that the Cubs (just) homered in the first inning of four consecutive games for the first time since the 1974 Cubs accomplished the feat.

It’s a nice nugget, one of many that anyone could cite if they are so inclined. It seems like sportswriters, broadcasters and their research staffs are obsessed with these “first time” or “first since” examples. And in the case of the first inning homer streak, the feat had no bearing on the games. The Cubs pounded out 14 homers during that four-game stretch at Wrigley, but went 1-3.

Two things that struck me about the ’74 Cubs reference. First, that Cubs team was trending downward and were not of the caliber of this team. Second, I wonder if the players on that team were aware of the feat.

The 1972-74 Cubs were among my favorite teams despite their mediocre records. That was the era when I started really paying attention to the team and the NL. I can still rattle off the names of those rosters more easily than I can recall what I had for lunch last week. I’d like to think I could guess at which players might have homered in the first innings of those games without consulting any clever websites. I’d bet on three of my favorites contributing, Jose Cardenal, Rick Monday and Billy Williams, but wouldn’t be shocked if it were a lesser name.

Another fact that emerged during yesterday’s game that was more interesting was Seiya Suzuki’s second homer in Sunday’s game was his 20th of the season and with that he and Pete Crow-Armstrong are the first pair of Cubs with 20+ homers before the All-Star break since Anthony Rizzo and Kris Bryant. More interestingly, Suzuki is one homer shy of his career high (21) with more than a half-season to play.