Colorado Rockies: May 14 holds an interesting piece of trivia for the team

May 14 might mark Mother’s Day in 2017, but it’s also the anniversary of a bit of a trivia when it comes to the Colorado Rockies.

Quick … can you name the last Colorado player to hit a home run in his first Major League at-bat? It happened on May 14, 1993. The player was Jay Gainer.

Gainer doesn’t exactly have a long history in Major League Baseball or with the Rockies. He had just 45 plate appearances during the 1993 season … and those would be his only appearances during his 23-game Major League career.

A first baseman called up from Triple-A Colorado Springs after leading the Pacific Coast League with 39 RBI, Gainer made his Major League debut against the Cincinnati Reds one to remember.

Inserted into the lineup as the cleanup hitter by manager Don Baylor in his first-ever game, Gainer took the first pitch he saw from Reds pitcher Tim Pugh over the right-center field wall for a solo home run. It was one of the few Rockies highlights of the day during a 13-5 win by Cincinnati.

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Gainer was originally drafted by the San Diego Padres in the 24^th round of the 1990 amateur draft out of the University of South Alabama. Traded by the Padres to the Rockies on March 21, 1993, in exchange for Denis Boucher, Gainer would go on to hit three home runs for the Rockies during the 1993 season. He hit just .171 on the campaign, bouncing between Colorado Springs and the Rockies. His last MLB appearance was on October 2, 1993, when he went 0-for-1 against the Atlanta Braves.

Gainer would be a part of the Rockies organization through the 1996 season, with his best campaign coming in 1995 when he blasted 23 homers and logged 86 RBI along with a .291 average. However, he’d never again break into the Colorado lineup.

His career came to a close in 2001 after four years of playing in Mexico and independent baseball.

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Since Gainer made his mark in Rockies history, 52 other Major League players have hit a home run in their first career at-bat. None of them, however, have been in a Colorado uniform.