Single-Season Home Run Leaders For Every Minor League

UPDATED: This story was originally published in 2011. We have updated it to reflect record-setting seasons since then.

Minor league baseball has changed dramatically through the years, so it’s important to acknowledge that fact when considering the single-season home run champions for the 16 extant minor leagues.

Baseball as we know it today began to take shape in the 1960s. The Angels, Astros, Mets and Senators/Rangers franchises began play in the early part of the decade, and by the the time the ’70s dawned the game had grown half again as large, expanding from 16 to 24 teams.

Jackie Robinson and Larry Doby, baseball pioneers, retired in the late ’50s. Against that backdrop, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Frank Robinson and Roberto Clemente began to establish themselves as the greatest position players of the ’60s, and Bob Gibson and Juan Marichal as the best pitchers.

Baseball instituted the amateur draft in 1965, forever changing the ways in which organizations scout and evaluate domestic talent. Nowhere is that more apparent than in the terrific book “Dollar Sign On The Muscle.”

As important as expansion, integration and the draft were to shaping the future of the game, baseball also codified its minor league structure in the early ’60s. Minor league teams played largely on their own in the first half of the 20th century, and teams and leagues boomed in post-World War II prosperity. The peak in 1948 saw 59 minor leagues operating in 438 cities, and the minors set overall attendance records that endured until the early 2000s.

The boom quickly crashed, however, and by 1959 there were just 21 minor leagues. Some worried that the minors would fail altogether, so major league teams started subsidizing their minor league brethren. The Player Development Plan went into effect in May 1962, assuring the survival of 100 minor league teams and creating the farm system as we know it today.

With major league organizations footing the bill for minor league salaries, player turnover intensified in the search for prospects with big league potential. Development, and not winning, took precedence in the minors. The flawed slugging first baseman/corner outfielder whose power doesn’t play in the high minors is no longer guaranteed steady employment.

Let’s first acknowledge the home run champs of the modern, post-1962 era, because we know what the classifications signify.

LEAGUE RECORDS FOR HOME RUNS IN A SEASON (1962-PRESENT)
LEAGUE	LVL	HR	PLAYER	TEAM	YEAR	AGE	AB	AB/HR
Amer. Assoc.	AAA	46	Ken Phelps	Wichita	1982	27	453	9.8
International	AAA	42	Phil Hiatt	Toledo	1996	27	555	13.2
Pacific Coast	AAA	50	Ron Kittle*	Edmonton	1982	24	472	9.4
Eastern	AA	41	Rick Lancellotti	Buffalo	1979	22	506	12.3
Southern	AA	42	Tim Laudner	Orlando	1981	23	433	10.3
Texas	AA	41	Arlo Engel	El Paso	1963	21	485	11.8
California	HiA	46	Dave Duncan	Modesto	1966	20	439	9.5
Carolina	HiA	49	Tony Solaita	High Pt-Thomasville	1968	21	467	9.5
Florida State	HiA	35	Ibandel Isabel	Daytona	2018	23	376	10.7
Midwest	LoA	42	Jeff Jones	Cedar Rapids	1982	24	432	10.3
South Atlantic	LoA	40	Russell Branyan	Columbus	1996	20	482	12.1
NY-Penn	SS	23	John Hennell	Utica	1982	24	270	11.7
Northwest	SS	25	Willie Darkis	Central Oregon	1980	20	252	10.1
Appalachian	R	24	Mitch Einertson	Greeneville	2004	18	227	9.5
Pioneer	R	23	Greg Morrison	Medicine Hat	1997	21	241	10.5
Arizona	R	18	Joey Gallo	Rangers	2012	18	150	8.3
Gulf Coast	R	14	Eric Arce	Blue Jays	2011	19	153	10.9

 

* Sacramento’s Bill McNulty hit 55 home runs in 1974, but according to the Pacific Coast League media guide: “Left field at Hughes Stadium, Sacramento, was less than the 250 feet prescribed in Official Baseball Rule 1.04,” and the league places an asterisk next to his record.

• The Toronto Sun’s Bob Elliott reported on 19-year-old left fielder Eric Arce’s home-run exploits in the Gulf Coast League, but the new record went largely unnoticed. A Blue Jays 25th-round pick from Tampa (no school) this year, Arce batted .268/.437/.621 with the record-setting 14 homers and GCL-leading 38 walks in 49 games.

• A pair of Elizabethton Twins teammates gave chase to Mitch Eintertson’s seven-year-old Appalachian League record this season. Center fielder Eddie Rosario, a 2010 fourth-round pick from Puerto Rico, batted .337/.397/.670 and mashed 21 homers in 67 games, while Dominican third baseman Miguel Sano batted .292/.352/.637 with 20 homers in 66 games.

• Two sluggers made valiant attempts on the South Atlantic and Florida State league home run records in 2008. An 18-year-old Mike Stanton, in his second pro season, mashed 39 homers for Greensboro, pulling to within one of Russell Branyan’s SAL record. The Marlins right fielder already has a 30-homer season (this year) in the big leagues prior to his 22nd birthday. Also in ’08, Tigers minor league first baseman Ryan Strieby belted 29 homers for Lakeland, coming within four of the FSL standard. This is more impressive than it sounds. In most seasons, the league’s home run champ finishes with a total in the low 20s—though Dunedin’s Brad Glenn mashed 26 this year.

Now the home run records that the leagues recognize, even though the classifications have changed in some cases.

LEAGUE RECORDS FOR HOME RUNS IN A SEASON (ALL-TIME)
LEAGUE	LVL	HR	PLAYER	TEAM	YEAR	AGE	AB	AB/HR
American Assoc	AA	69	Joe Hauser	Minneapolis	1933	34	570	8.3
International	AA	63	Joe Hauser	Baltimore	1930	31	617	9.8
Pacific Coast	AA	60	Tony Lazzeri	Salt Lake City	1925	21	710	11.8
Eastern	A	41	Ken Strong	Hazelton	1930	23	450	11.0
	AA	41	Rick Lancellotti	Buffalo	1979	22	506	12.3
Southern	AA	42	Tim Laudner	Orlando	1981	23	433	10.3
Texas	AA	62	Ken Guettler	Shreveport	1956	29	481	7.8
California	C	51	Bud Heslet	Visalia	1956	36	524	10.3
Carolina	B	55	Muscle Shoals	Reidsville	1949	32	501	9.1
Florida State	D	33	Ed Levy	Sanford	1950	33	406	12.3
	HiA	35	Ibandel Isabel	Daytona	2018	20	376	10.7
Midwest	LoA	42	Jeff Jones	Cedar Rapids	1982	24	432	10.3
South Atlantic	LoA	40	Russell Branyan	Columbus	1996	20	482	12.1

* Now tied with Isabel.

• All the short-season league records were established in the post-1962 era except for one. A 24-year-old Joy Gritts hit 24 home runs in 252 at-bats for the ’60 Wytheville Senators of the Appalachian League. (The league operated at the Class D level at the time.) Mitch Einertston matched Gritts’ record in 2004.

• Note that while the International and Pacific Coast leagues are classified here as Double-A, they still operated at the highest level of the minors in the 1920s and ’30s. However, Joe Hauser played in 168 games in ’30 and Tony Lazzeri in 197 in ’25, so direct comparisons to today’s game are tenuous.

Now for some modern perspective, the league home run records since 1992, the beginning of the modern boom years for the minors and the explosion of offense in the major leagues.

LEAGUE RECORDS FOR HOME RUNS IN A SEASON (1992-PRESENT)
LEAGUE	LVL	HR	PLAYER	TEAM	YEAR	AGE	AB	AB/HR
International	AAA	42	Phil Hiatt	Toledo	1996	27	555	13.2
Pacific Coast	AAA	46	Chris Hatcher	Omaha	1998	29	485	10.5
Eastern	AA	40	Dylan Cozens	Reading	2016	22	521	13.0
Southern	AA	34	Derrek Lee	Memphis	1996	20	500	14.7
Texas	AA	40	Brandon Berger	Wichita	2001	26	454	11.4
California	HiA	43	Brandon Wood	Rancho Cucamonga	2005	20	536	12.5
Carolina	HiA	34	Danny Peoples	Kinston	1997	22	409	12.0
Florida State	HiA	35	Ibandel Isabel	Daytona	2018	23	376	10.7
Midwest	LoA	39	Brian Dopirak	Lansing	2004	20	541	13.9
South Atlantic	LoA	40	Russell Branyan	Columbus	1996	20	482	12.1
New York-Penn	SS	22	Dan Grummitt	Hudson Valley	1999	23	287	13.0
Northwest	SS	21	Steve Hacker	Eugene	1996	21	292	13.9
Appalachian	R	24	Mitch Einertson	Greeneville	2004	18	227	9.5
Pioneer	R	23	Greg Morrison	Medicine Hat	1997	21	241	10.5
Arizona	R	18	Joey Gallo	Rangers	2012	18	150	8.3
Gulf Coast	R	14	Eric Arce	Blue Jays	2011	19	153	10.9

• All but one of the top minor league home run marks were set in the 10-year window from 1996 to 2005. (Of course, a similar thing happened in the big leagues.) The Cubs’ Derrick Bly previously held the Gulf Coast League homer record with 13 in—naturally—1996. Mariners outfielder Wladimir Balentien set the previous Arizona League record with 16 in 2003 before Joey Gallo came along in 2012.

Sources

• “Encyclopedia Of Minor League Baseball, Third Edition” by Lloyd Johnson and Miles Wolff (2007)
• “Going For The Fences: The Minor League Home Run Book, Second Edition” by Bob McConnell (2009)
• Baseball-Reference.com <http://www.baseball-reference.com/minors/>
• Various minor league media guides

The records above are accurate to the best of our knowledge. Leave a comment below if you have proof of an error.