Steve Garvey goes off 37 years ago – fives across the board

On this date 37 years ago Steve Garvey had one of the all time great offensive Los Angeles Dodger games when he collected three doubles and two home runs with one of the coolest box scores you will ever see.

Five across the board for the Garv.
Five at bats
Five hits
Five runs scored
Five rbi

A grand total of 14 total bases. It was no Shawn Green but it was still one hell of a game. The best part of this game is that I can still remember Vin Scully talking about how he had never seen a player hit the ball so hard in every at bat. As Vinny would say it was as if Garvey was taking out his previous slump on every pitch.

Slump you say. Yup, headed into that game Garvey was in one of his worst offensive slumps that started on August 6th. For the next 84 plate appearances Steve Garvey would have one extra base hit and a tragic triple slash line of .139 / .169 / .152.

Talk about a slump buster game.

Historically using total bases this game ranks as the 3rd best in LA Dodger history. It was certainly the best game of Garvey’s career, and for him it couldn’t have come at a better time.

Player                  Date    Rslt PA R H 2B 3B HR TB RBI
Shawn Green       2002-05-23  W 16-3  6 6 6  1  0  4 19   7

Davey Lopes       1974-08-20  W 18-8  6 3 5  1  0  3 15   4

Steve Garvey      1977-08-28  W 11-0  5 5 5  3  0  2 14   5

Provided by Baseball-Reference.com: View Play Index Tool Used
Generated 8/28/2014.