Bob Horner obit

 

Longtime Atlanta Braves infielder Bob Horner dies at 68

He was not on the list.

ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) - Longtime Atlanta Braves infielder Bob Horner died Tuesday, according to the team. He was 68.

His cause of death is currently unknown.

Horner, who was selected by Atlanta with the No. 1 overall pick in 1978 and famously reached the majors without ever playing a minor league game, played for Atlanta from 1978-86, racking up 1,047 hits, 218 home runs and 685 RBIs while earning one All-Star selection (1982). He was named National League Rookie of the Year in 1978 after slashing .266/.313/.539 with 23 home runs and 63 RBIs.

He was also the first Atlanta player to ever hit four home runs in a single game. That happened in 1986 against the Montreal Expos.

“Bob Horner built a career out of being first,” the team said in a statement. “The Atlanta Braves extend sincere sympathies to his wife, Chris, two sons, Tyler and Trent, and his numerous friends and fans across the game.”

Horner paired with Dale Murphy to form one of the league’s most formidable power-hitting duos for contending Braves teams in the early 1980s. Horner hit 30 home runs in a season three times — in 1979, 1980 and 1982 — while receiving Most Valuable Player votes in three different seasons. During Horner’s tenure with Atlanta, Murphy won back-to-back National League MVP awards in 1982 and 1983.

The team did not retain Horner following the 1986 season, and he went unsigned in the major leagues during the 1987 campaign. Determined to keep playing, Horner signed a one-year, $2 million contract with the Yakult Swallows of Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball.

He returned to the majors and played one season for the St. Louis Cardinals in 1988, posting a .703 OPS in 60 games, largely limited by a lingering shoulder injury that dated to his college days at Arizona State University, before announcing his retirement on March 9, 1989.

After a record-setting NCAA College athletic career with the Arizona State Sun Devils baseball team, Horner bypassed the minor leagues and moved directly to the major leagues, where together with Dale Murphy, he formed a power-hitting tandem for the Atlanta Braves teams of the early 1980s. Horner averaged 35 home runs and 109 runs batted in per his 162-game average and became the 11th player in Major League Baseball history to hit four home runs in one game on July 6, 1986.

Horner became a victim of the Major League Baseball collusion scandal of 1986–87 after the courts found that owners had illegally shared information during free agency negotiations seeking to deflate player salaries. He was among hundreds of players and former players who were awarded millions of dollars in lost salary. He played the 1987 season in the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) for the Yakult Swallows, before returning to play one final season in MLB with the St. Louis Cardinals in 1988. A string of injuries prematurely ended Horner's baseball career after just 11 seasons. He was inducted into the College Baseball Hall of Fame as a member of its inaugural class on July 4, 2006.

Horner was born in Junction City, Kansas, but grew up in Glendale, Arizona. He attended Apollo High School, where he set school records.

As a freshman at Arizona State in 1976, he hit .339 with 42 RBI and nine home runs (tied with Ike Davis for third all-time by a Sun Devil freshman, two behind Barry Bonds) as ASU won the Western Athletic Conference championship and made a trip to the College World Series.

As a sophomore, Horner was a First Team All-American as he hit .389 with 87 RBI and a school record 22 home runs as ASU again won the WAC title. The Sun Devils went on to win the 1977 College World Series with Horner winning the Most Outstanding Player award.

In his junior and final season at ASU, Horner hit .412, 100 RBI and a new school-record 25 home runs, leading the team to a third-consecutive conference title and another trip to the College World Series.

His college career at Arizona State University culminated with Horner again being named a First Team All-American and the first winner of the Golden Spikes Award, college baseball's equivalent of the Heisman Trophy.

Overall, at ASU, Horner batted .383 with a then-NCAA and still-standing ASU record 56 home runs and 229 RBI.

Horner was drafted by Atlanta with the first overall pick in the 1978 amateur draft, and he made his Major League Baseball debut the same year. He is among the few players who went straight from college to a starting position in the major leagues without spending any time in the minors. In his first game, he belted a home run off future Hall of Fame pitcher Bert Blyleven of the Pirates. In 89 games, Horner batted .266 with 23 home runs and 63 runs batted in in 323 at-bats, with an on-base percentage of .313 and a slugging percentage of .539. His 23 home runs led all National League third basemen in 1978. He won the National League Rookie of the Year award over Ozzie Smith.

In 1985, Horner played 130 games and finished with a .267 batting average, 27 home runs, and 89 RBIs. In 1986, Horner set personal career highs. On July 6, 1986, in a game against the Expos, he became the eleventh player in Major League Baseball history to hit four home runs in a single game and only the second one to do so in a game that his team lost (the first one being Ed Delahanty). Later in the season, after hitting a record 210 career home runs without a grand slam home run, Horner finally belted a homer with the bases loaded to give the Braves a 4–2 victory over the Pirates. Horner's record for homers without a grand slam stood until 1998 when Sammy Sosa surpassed the mark by hitting his first grand slam on the 248th home run of his career.