Key keywords: Seiya Suzuki 100th career home run, Chicago Cubs Seiya Suzuki, Japanese MLB stars 100 HR club, Shohei Ohtani Ichiro Suzuki MLB records, 2024 MLB regular season milestones, Japanese-born MLB players all-time stats, Cubs 2024 playoff push On June 12, 2024, Chicago Cubs right fielder Seiya Suzuki etched his name into MLB history books by launching his 100th career home run during the Cubs’ road matchup against the Pittsburgh Pirates at PNC Park. The two-run blast, hit off Pirates starting pitcher Jared Jones in the top of the fourth inning, pushed the Cubs to an early 3-0 lead that they would hold on to for their 42nd win of the 2024 regular season. With the milestone home run, Suzuki became just the third Japanese-born player in MLB history to reach the 100 career home run mark, joining exclusive company that includes Los Angeles Dodgers two-way superstar Shohei Ohtani and Seattle Mariners legend Ichiro Suzuki. While Ichiro, a contact-hitting icon who played 19 seasons in MLB, finished his career with 117 total home runs, Seiya Suzuki reached the 100-HR mark in just 462 career games, nearly 1,800 games faster than Ichiro hit the same milestone. Ohtani, who holds the record for the most home runs by a Japanese-born MLB player with over 250 and counting, reached 100 career home runs in 396 games, making Suzuki the second-fastest Japanese player ever to hit the mark. Suzuki first signed with the Cubs ahead of the 2022 MLB season after 9 standout seasons with the Hiroshima Toyo Carp in Nippon Professional Baseball, where he hit 182 home runs and won 5 NPB All-Star honors. He made an immediate impact in his rookie MLB campaign, winning National League Rookie of the Month honors in April 2022 and finishing the season with 16 home runs, 86 runs batted in, and a .262 batting average. He followed that up with 25 home runs in 2023, and has already notched 30 home runs through the first 68 games of the 2024 season, putting him on pace to hit a career-high 52 home runs by the end of the regular season. In a post-game interview following the milestone, Suzuki called the achievement “a dream come true” and noted that he grew up idolizing both Ichiro and Ohtani as a young player in Japan. “To be mentioned in the same sentence as those two legends is something I never would have thought possible when I first started playing baseball,” he said through a translator. “My main focus right now is keeping this hot streak going, helping the Cubs lock up a playoff spot, and bringing a World Series trophy back to the city of Chicago.” Cubs manager David Ross also praised Suzuki after the game, calling him “one of the most underrated power hitters in the National League” and noting that his consistency in the middle of the Cubs lineup has been a key driver of the team’s success so far in 2024. The Cubs currently sit second in the National League Central division, just 1.5 games behind the first-place Milwaukee Brewers, and are widely projected to earn a wild card playoff spot if they maintain their current pace.