Atlanta Braves: Will Ronald Acuna Beat Rickey Henderson’s Record?

Atlanta Braves: Ronald Acuna Jr. slugged his 20th career home run against the Nationals on Tuesday. Can he finish as the all-time leadoff home run king?

The Atlanta Braves young superstar Ronald Acuna Jr. belted his first two homers of the season on Tuesday against Max Scherzer.

One of those homers was on the first pitch of the game. It was the 20th leadoff home run of Acuna’s young career.

Understandably, Acuna has spent some time in traditional, run-producing lineup spots due to his tremendous power.

The 23-year-old has settled in as the everyday leadoff hitter for the team. While being a threat to win the home run crown, Acuna has elite on-base skills and led the league in steals in 2019 with 37 swipes.

The numbers are eye-popping as he approaches the top-ten list for most leadoff homers.

In 234 games as the first batter, Acuna has taken 14 walks and launched 20 bombs. That means he’s hitting a home run every 10.8 at-bats to begin a contest.

All-Time Leader: Rickey Henderson

Rickey Henderson is the all-time leadoff home run champion with 81 career game-opening dingers.

Henderson had 2,875 plate appearances as the first batter of the game throughout his illustrious career. His 81 homers.

Since we are talking about leading off the game, that’s nearly 18 full season’s worth of games.

That longevity is the leadoff spot is probably not going to be matched by Acuna.

Why Ronald Acuna Jr. Has a Chance To Surpass Rickey Henderson

Ronald Acuna Jr. Is a new breed of a leadoff hitter.

As a leadoff hitter, Acuna starts a game off with a home run once every 11.7 games.

Henderson may have played a really long time and put up spectacular leadoff hitter numbers, but he simply doesn’t match up in the power department.

As a leadoff hitter, Henderson opened a contest up with a dinger every 35.5 games.

Will Ronald Acuna Jr. Remain in the Leadoff Spot Long Enough to Pass Henderson?

We know he’s got the ability, but will the team’s circumstances allow Acuna to remain in the leadoff role for the long term?

He certainly provides an appealing source of power to hit from the three or four-spot in the future. It’s something that is discussed every season.

“Where should Acuna hit in the order?”

For now, Acuna remains a premium table-setter for Freeman and Ozuna. He provides the added bonus of monster homers to get the Braves going.

At his current pace, Acuna only needs to lead off 725.4 more games.

That doesn’t sound like a lot compared to Henderson’s 2,785 games but keep in mind, that’s nearly 4.5 year’s worth of games!

If Freeman sticks around and the Braves continue to believe in Acuna as a long-term table-setter, he could end up blowing the all-time record out of the water. It should be a fun sidenote to pay attention to over the next few years.