2025 MLB season joins rare company amid power barrage

Regardless which two players end up being named the American League and National League MVP, four different players have surpassed 50 home runs as the regular season comes to a close. And this collective effort enhances the historic nature of the 2025 season beyond the history each player has set individually. 

2025 is the first season to include four players with 50 or more home runs in the same year since 2001, and it's only the third such season all-time. 

In 2001, Alex Rodriguez hit 52 for the Rangers in the first of his three 50+ home run seasons, Giants legend Barry Bonds broke MLB's single-season record by hitting 73, which ironically stands as the only 50 homer season of his entire career, eventual Diamondbacks World Series hero Luis Gonzalez crushed 57 and Sammy Sosa blasted 64 for the Cubs, marking the last of his four consecutive 50 homer seasons. 

At that time, those four players together made 2001 join 1998 as the only other summer with four hitters reaching 50 home runs. 

In 1998, when it happened for the first time in the history of the sport, Greg Vaughn launched exactly 50 for the National League champion Padres, Ken Griffey Jr. hit 56 to match his total from the previous season and become the first player to hit 50 while also winning a Gold Glove for his defensive prowess TWICE, Cardinals masher Mark McGwire made 70 the new MLB single-season mark and Sosa started his impressive streak with his career-high of 66. 

Prior to 1998, only five seasons saw multiple players with 50 in the same year - two of those five seasons occurred in 1997 and 1996. Before 1996, it had only happened three times, with the last being when Yankees teammates Roger Maris, who broke Babe Ruth's then single-season record with 61, and Mickey Mantle (54) did it. 

Overall throughout MLB history, there have 54 occurrences of a player hitting at least 50 home runs in a given season. The first time two players reached the milestone in the same season was in 1938 when Hank Greenberg led the league with 58 and Jimmie Fox hit 50. 

So the moral of this story is no matter what happens from this point on or who actually is named MVP, 2025 will forever stand out as one fans should appreciate.