Griffey, Ken, Jr.

▪ American baseball player

in full  George Kenneth Griffey, Jr. 

born November 21, 1969, Donora, Pennsylvania, U.S.

      American professional baseball player who was one of the dominant power hitters of the 1990s and ranked among the best defensive outfielders of all time.

      In 1987 Griffey was the first player selected by the major league baseball draft and was signed by the American League Seattle Mariners. He made his major league debut in 1989. His father, outfielder Ken Griffey, Sr., was playing for the Cincinnati Reds in that year, and the Griffeys thus became the first father and son ever to play in the major leagues at the same time. Griffey, Sr., arranged to be traded to the Mariners late in the 1989 season, and the two formed a sentimental duo in the lineup until his retirement in 1991. Griffey, Jr., soon began to prove his worth as both a centre fielder and a hitter. He was injured in his rookie season, but in 1990 he won his first Gold Glove Award, had a batting average of .300, and played in the All-Star Game. He went on to win the American League Gold Glove Award for the years 1991–99 with his spectacular fielding. In 1997, when Griffey hit 56 home runs and batted in 147 runs, he was a unanimous selection for the American League's Most Valuable Player award.

      In 2000 Griffey became a free agent and chose to be traded to Cincinnati, which he considered his hometown and where his father worked as a coach. Though his contract was the most lucrative one in baseball history to that time, it was only a fraction of what he could have received from a team in a larger market.

      Griffey struggled with a series of injuries in Cincinnati. When he was on the field, he remained a dangerous left-handed hitter. In 2004 he became the 20th major league player to hit 500 home runs, and he was named to the National League All-Star team in 2000, 2004, and 2007. In 2008, after hitting his 600th career home run, Griffey joined Barry Bonds (Bonds, Barry), Hank Aaron (Aaron, Hank), Babe Ruth (Ruth, Babe), Willie Mays (Mays, Willie), and Sammy Sosa (Sosa, Sammy) as the only players in major league history to accomplish that feat. Griffey was traded to the Chicago White Sox in July 2008.

Robert William Verdi

 

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