Rare home runs were all the rage last night. Besides Angel Berroa’s epic shot, here’s another story to pin on the ol’ inspirational “If at first you don’t succeed, etc.” bulletin board: After toiling away for 19 years in the minors, 36-year-old rookie Scott McClain finally cranked out his first major league home run.

As is the case in stories like this, some crazy stats are coming to light: McClain went through 7,301 professional at-bats before last night, he knocked out 362 home runs in the minors and Japan before his “official” first, and, most importantly, he was born on the exact same day as Ace of Base singer Jenny Berggren!

SF GATE has some more:

There were no smiles, no handshakes, until clubhouse manager Mike Murphy gave McClain a high-five. Murphy is too nice to snub anybody. Then came the avalanche of hugs and backslaps for the 36-year-old infielder, whose solo homer against fellow rookie Steven Register was the most delicious moment in a 9-2 Giants victory at Coors Field, their only win on a 1-5 trip.

With one out in the sixth inning, after Pablo Sandoval hit his second home run in the bigs, McClain powered a hanging 2-2 slider deep into the left-field seats and took the 360-foot tour of his life.

“I wanted to slow things down to a walk and take it all in,” McClain said. “There was a sense of relief. There was a lot of pressure these guys put on me to get that one out of the way.”

While everyone’s making a big deal about this geriatric Dennis Quaid-esque “rookie” hitting his first home run, technically McClain had already been called up a few times in his career.

Back in ‘98 he was given 20 at-bats with the Devil Rays, and in ‘05 he got another 14 with the Cubs, so it’s not like the dude didn’t have experience. Honestly, we think everyone’s making too big of a deal about this. Before last night, he’d already had 50 major league at-bats! Just another case of spin by the liberal media!

But really, congrats go out to McClain. And judging by the talent level on the Giants, he should probably unpack his bags. He has a chance of sticking around for awhile.