2008 Major League Baseball Season - Accomplishments - Team Milestones

Team Milestones

• The Philadelphia Phillies notched two 20-run games in one season for their first time since 1900.
• The Colorado Rockies and San Diego Padres played a game that took 22 innings to complete on April 17 at Petco Park, lasting 6 hours, 16 minutes, marking the longest game (in terms of innings played) in the history of both franchises. The Rockies won 2–1. The Padres would later play another long home game on May 25, this time an 18-inning affair against the Cincinnati Reds. The game, which ran five hours, 57 minutes was the longest game (time wise) in the Reds' history.
• The Chicago Cubs won their 10,000th National League game on April 23, defeating the Colorado Rockies 7–6 in 10 innings. The Cubs also won 77 games during their time in the National Association (1871–1875), a predecessor of the National League, but those wins are not counted by Major League Baseball. The San Francisco Giants are the only other professional sports team with more than 10,000 wins, having reached that milestone in 2005.
• The St. Louis Cardinals achieved a franchise record of 18 wins for the month of April.
• The Florida Marlins had their best start in franchise history, with a record of 22–14.
• The Tampa Bay Rays had their best start in franchise history, with a record of 55–32, 23 games over .500. Along with their best start, they are the first team since 1900 with the worst record in baseball the previous year to have the best record on July 4. On August 10, the Rays earned their 71st victory in a 11–4 win over the Seattle Mariners. This bests the franchise's previous best of 70 wins in 2004. They would ultimately win 97 games by the end of the regular season, 27 more than their previous record. The Rays reached the postseason for the first time in the Franchise's history.
• On August 12, the Boston Red Sox scored ten runs in the first inning, but had to come from behind to beat the Texas Rangers, who had overcome two ten-run deficits in this game, by a score of 19–17. On September 8, the Red Sox set a Major League Baseball record for the longest consecutive streak of home-park sellout games with their 456th consecutive sellout. The previous record had been held by the Cleveland Indians, who sold out 455 games between June 12, 1995 and April 2, 2001. The streak began on May 15, 2003, in a 14–3 blowout against the Texas Rangers. The Red Sox are only the fourth team to sell out every home game of an entire season, the others being the 1996 Colorado Rockies and the 2000 San Francisco Giants.
• On September 10, the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim clinched the American League West division title, becoming the earliest team to clinch that division in its history. On September 28, the Angels won their 100th game of the season, beating their previous record of 99 back in 2002.
• The Seattle Mariners lost 100 games for the first time since the 1983 season, a span of 25 years. They are also the first team to lose 100 games with a US $100 million payroll. Meanwhile, they had company as the Washington Nationals also registered 100 losses, marking the first time since the 1976 season, when the franchise was known as the Montréal Expos, that they would reach this dubious mark.
• The Milwaukee Brewers secured their first playoff berth since 1982 by winning the NL Wild Card berth.
• The Chicago White Sox broke the club record for grand slams in a single season with 12. The White Sox also became the first team ever to win their last three games of the season against three different teams: 5–1 vs. Cleveland Indians in the scheduled season ending game on September 28, 8–2 vs Detroit Tigers in a make-up game on September 29 from a rainout 16 days earlier, and a one-game playoff on September 30 1–0 vs Minnesota Twins respectively.
• The Florida Marlins are the first team in MLB history to have all four infielders hit 25 or more home runs (Jorge Cantú, 29, Mike Jacobs/Dan Uggla, 32, and Hanley Ramírez, 33)