Let's settle it: Who hit most majestic Wrigley HR?

Dave Kingman in 1979 vs. Glenallen Hill in 2000

April 13th, 2020

There have been tens of thousands of home runs hit at Wrigley Field. That's what happens when you have a ballpark that's 106 years old. The first was hit by 5-foot-8, 170-pound Art Wilson in 1914 for the Chicago Whales.

And, of course, there have been a number of momentous blasts ever since: Sammy Sosa smashed an apartment window with a walk-off shot in 1996, Kris Bryant hit one 495 feet off his own face in 2015, Roberto Clemente mashed one an estimated 510 feet, exiting left of the center-field scoreboard and bounding another 100 or so feet to an abandoned gas station parking lot. There's no video, but there is this mind-boggling map from Bleed Cubbie Blue. Clemente's home run eventually came to rest in the area noted with a "C."

But the two most absurd, most physics-defying Wrigley dingers on video have to be Dave Kingman's prodigious moonshot on May 17, 1979.

And Glenallen Hill's gravity-shattering missile in 2000.

But which was better?

The case for Kingman

"That one's in Milwaukee!" Cubs broadcaster Lou Boudreau summed up the titanic blast pretty well. 's homer, his third of the day (part of an absurd 23-22 loss to the Phillies), went over the left-field fence, over Waveland Avenue and came to rest on the porch of the third house along Kenmore Avenue. Look at this kid probably just going out to get his mail. Now he's on a highlight reel for all eternity.

“The wind was like a hurricane, and Kingman hit one that went up so far, I’ve never seen a ball like that,” Phillies shortstop Larry Bowa said. “Usually I’d just put my head down, but it was up so high I said, 'I’ve got to watch this.'”

“It went over our heads by a mile,” said Rich Buhrke, a ballhawk positioned on Waveland Ave.

The shot was estimated to be around 550 feet (Kingman hit an almost identical home run as a visiting player a few years before that the New York Times claimed went 630 feet, so maybe it was even farther?) Either way, it's been called the longest of his career and perhaps the longest in Wrigley Field history.

The case for Hill

For a man who's terrified of spiders, was one tough-looking dude.

Watch his homer again -- it's almost as if the ball didn't even go anywhere. It just exploded into a puff of smoke when it made contact with his bat. And then, there it was again -- way out on top of the roof of a building across the street in a place nobody had reached or even dreamed of reaching before.

"In the years I've played here and coached here, I haven't seen any ball hit that far," former Cubs star and then-coach Billy Williams said. "Sammy [Sosa] has hit the building, but nobody [had] hit it onto the roof."

The dinger was measured at 500 feet, but Hill felt that was a vast underestimation: "Try 700 feet. Seriously." The distance went up to nearly 800 feet when Hill was asked about it a few years ago.

Imagine if there was no building in the way? How far then? Would it still be going today? Hill probably thinks so.

Now, we put the question out to you: Which Wrigley Field home run impressed you more? Vote for your favorite in the poll below: