Bob Horner

Bob Horner, who died in May 2026, was one of those players who felt almost too good to be true — an Arizona kid who skipped the minors entirely, went straight from Arizona State to the Atlanta Braves, and won NL Rookie of the Year in 1978 like it was nothing. Third baseman with genuine power, the kind of guy who could carry a lineup on a hot summer night. What really gets me is the Japan chapter: he spent 1987 with the Yakult Swallows, and the Japanese fans absolutely loved him — this big American slugger embracing a completely different baseball culture. That crossover story alone makes him more interesting than half the Hall of Fame candidates who never left the States. His career was shorter than it should have been, injuries being the cruel tax on big bodies, but when Bob Horner connected, you remembered it.

This take was written by generative AI, one per person, from publicly reported facts (editorial policy). It is a reading of the record, not reporting.

Name (English)

Bob Horner

Name (Japanese)

ボブ・ホーナー

Reading

ぼぶ・ほーなー

Born

August 6, 1957 – May 26, 2026

Origin

Maricopa County, Arizona, United States

Height

185 cm

Occupation

baseball player

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Leo / Rooster

High school

Apollo High School

• Wikipedia (English)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob%20Horner
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%83%9C%E3%83%96%E3%83%BB%E3%83%9B%E3%83%BC%E3%83%8A%E3%83%BC
• Wikidatahttps://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q4932854

Tags

• Arizona
• baseball player

Last updated

October 18, 2026

Only publicly available facts are listed; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. Base data was compiled from Wikidata from June 2026 onward; ages are recalculated daily and deaths are checked against Wikidata on an ongoing basis. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.