The Shocking Truth About Jose Fernandez’s Debut That No One Saw Coming

Among Arizona players, Jose is obviously the first to hit two homers in his first career game. Though he isn’t the first to do so in his first game for the D-backs. Most notably, Felipe Lopez did so on Opening Day 2006 – he did so from both sides of the plate that day (Tony Clark also had a LHB and RHB blast in same game). Nor is Jose the youngest Diamondback with a two-homer contest. Unsurprisingly, that honor belongs to Justin Upton. He had a pair of such games in May 2009, at the age of 21, a year younger than Fernandez. Teammate Alek Thomas also performed the feat in 2022, when he was about five months younger.

In terms of games, the previous quickest to have a double long-ball game for Arizona belonged to Conor Jackson. He did it in August 2005, during the sixth game of his career. Other Diamondbacks to do it in ten games or fewer were Mark Reynolds and Wyatt Mathisen. The last-named is probably why we shouldn’t get TOO excited yet about Fernandez. Mathisen’s entire MLB career lasted only 32 games, with only a single home-run hit outside that magical night in September 2020 – where he played third base, like Jose.

Win Probability

It wasn’t just the home-runs, it was when Fernandez hit them. In particular, the second, which turned a 5-4 deficit into a 7-5 lead. And with the D-backs down to their final four outs as well. All that adds up to a monstrous +64.1% of Win Probability added by Fernandez. For a first game, that smashes the previous high for Arizona by more than thirty percent. The previous best belonged to Stone Garrett – another “Who’s he?” in franchise history. He had a pair of key doubles in a 3-2 win at San Francisco, worth 34.8%. According to Baseball Reference, four players have posted a higher Win Probability in their debut, most recently Zach Remillard’s 69.7% for the White Sox in 2023. Guess who had a blown save in that game for Seattle, courtesy of Remillard? Paul Sewald…