Orlando Arcia makes contact twice on one swing

It’s an age-old rule of baseball: If you’re not bunting, you can’t strike out on a foul ball. Even if you foul it off twice on the same pitch.

This informal addendum was necessary for Atlanta’s Orlando Arcia during a Thursday night showdown against the D-backs at Chase Field. On a 1-2 count with two outs in a scoreless game in the third inning, Arizona starter Brandon Pfaadt threw a 95 mph sinker low in the zone. The outcome was certainly one you don’t see every day.

Arcia topped the ball, hitting it directly into the ground. The ball then bounced up vertically, and when it was near his head, his bat came into contact with the ball again during his back swing.

On a scorecard, it simply goes down as a foul ball, one that was part of an eventual strikeout. But the game isn’t played on spreadsheets, and the fans who saw it unfold at Chase Field know that they witnessed something a little bit different.

However, while an event like this is uncommon, it has been done before. Several players have even managed to reach base while making contact twice on the same pitch. As such, while Arcia turned some heads on Thursday, there are some even more niche baseball achievements out there for the taking.