Matt Kemp homered Friday in the Dodgers’ 6-1 win over the Rockies to become the 55th player in big-league history to turn in a 30-homer, 30-steal season.
Kemp took Matt Reynolds deep in the seventh inning to reach 30 homers for the first time. His previous high was last year’s 28.
Kemp, who entered the game with 33 steals, is the first player to go 30/30 since the Rangers’ Ian Kinsler in 2009 and the first National Leaguer since Brandon Phillips, Jimmy Rollins and David Wright all got there in 2007.
He’s the first Dodger to pull off the feat since Raul Mondesi in 1999.
Kemp has an outside chance of joining Jose Canseco, Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez and Alfonso Soriano in the 40-40 club. The seven steals shouldn’t be all that difficult, but he will need 10 homers in 32 games, which means he’ll have to get hot.
35/35 is more realistic, and while those aren’t magic numbers, he’d be the first player to get there since Soriano had his 46-homer, 41-steal season in 2006.
