ST. PETERSBURG -- Junior Caminero lifted and lowered his left leg, turned his body and unleashed the kind of swing he’s understandably become known for. Quick, powerful, ferocious. He kept his left arm extended and watched the ball fly out toward the netting hundreds of feet away, bound for a landing spot few can even hope to reach.
“I just hit the ball as hard as I could, gave it everything I had,” Caminero said through interpreter Kevin Vera.
Surely by now you’ve watched the viral video of the ball he golfed into orbit on a rare Wednesday night off at Topgolf, right? Well, wait until you see what he did to a pair of baseballs in the Rays’ 6-2 win over the Twins on Friday night at Tropicana Field.
“Those weren't cheap ones that Caminero hit,” Twins manager Derek Shelton said. “This kid is going to be one of the best young hitters in the game for a long time. Tonight, he showed why.”
Caminero and Jonathan Aranda each clubbed a pair of home runs against former teammate Taj Bradley, four majestic blasts totaling a projected 1,701 feet. It was Caminero’s fifth career multihomer game, the first of Aranda’s career and a remarkably rare occurrence for the Rays.
It was the ninth time in franchise history the Rays had multiple players record multihomer performances in the same game and the first since Mike Zunino and Nelson Cruz did so in Boston on Sept. 7, 2021. It was only their second such performance at Tropicana Field, as Ryan Hanigan and Wil Myers each went deep twice against the Yankees on April 19, 2014.
“They’re both All-Stars for a reason, right?” said starter Drew Rasmussen, who held the Twins to just one run and struck out six over six innings in his first start with his newborn daughter, Miller Drew, in attendance. “They’re both really good players.”
What Caminero did in the series opener was a display of the special raw power and elite bat speed that catapulted him into stardom last season -- and helped him smash that poor golf ball into oblivion two nights ago.
Facing Bradley in the first inning, Caminero took three straight pitches to get ahead in the count, then unloaded on a high, 97.5 mph fastball over the middle and just above the strike zone. The ball erupted off his bat at 111 mph and sailed straight out to center field, arcing over the batter’s eye and landing on the protective netting over the Budweiser Porch.
How good did that one feel off the bat?
“When I hit it,” Caminero said, “I [felt] nothing.”
The first home run allowed by Bradley all season traveled a projected 450 feet, according to Statcast. It was the longest homer of Caminero’s young career, the longest at the Trop since a 452-footer by Josh Lowe on Aug. 24, 2023, and the longest by a Rays hitter since Brandon Lowe blasted one 458 feet against the A’s last August.
“It’s just very uncharacteristic to see it go above the batter's eye and land up there,” Rays manager Kevin Cash said. “But we know we can hit 'em, and he got a hold of that one.”
But Caminero wasn’t done. One pitch after breaking his bat on a ball he pulled just foul down the left-field line, Caminero settled back into the batter’s box and blasted a middle-middle fastball a projected 435 feet to center for a two-run homer, his eighth of the season.
“Any time he finds the barrel to it, it's got a chance to go,” Cash said. “That's just the type of power that he generates.”
After hitting 45 homers last year, Caminero has earned his reputation as a slugger. Aranda might be viewed as more of a well-balanced, all-around hitter -- but he’s got plenty of pop, too.
In the fourth, Aranda lifted an inside fastball a projected 402 feet into the right-field seats. He delivered a nearly identical solo shot in the sixth inning, this time launching an inside curveball a projected 414 feet to right off Bradley for his second homer of the night and sixth of the season.
Aranda was Bradley’s teammate for years in Tampa Bay’s Minor League system, but he figured Friday night was the first time they ever squared off. Bradley won their first battle, catching Aranda looking at a curveball after throwing him three straight fastballs.
Aranda won the next two rounds. He finished the night with six homers and 21 RBIs on the season, second-most in the American League behind only Yordan Alvarez (26 RBIs).
“I know what he's capable of,” Aranda said through interpreter Kevin Vera. “But I'm here to compete, right?”
That, and to put on a show with his fellow All-Star infielder.
“Amazing. Amazing,” Caminero said. “Four homers together.”