Ripken holds the record for consecutive games played (2,632), having surpassed Lou Gehrig's streak of 2,130 which had stood for 56 years and which many deemed was unbreakable.

[14] Ripken began his high school career playing second base; his coach, Don Morrison, said, "I was considering moving him to short, but I was unsure if his arm was strong enough.

[22] On deciding to go straight from high school to the professional level, he said, "When the colleges started coming around, Dad and I talked about mostly whether I was going to pursue a career in baseball.

"[27] On July 2, Ripken hit his first professional home run, a game-winner in the 12th inning against Joseph Abone of the West Palm Beach Expos.

[28] His performance earned him a brief call-up to the Charlotte Orioles of the Double-A Southern League; Ripken batted .180 in a month with them, albeit with three home runs.

Ripken started at third base and played all 33 innings against the Pawtucket Red Sox (which featured another future Hall of Famer, Wade Boggs) in a game that took parts of three days to complete.

[71] Fifteen days later, he passed Steve Garvey by playing in his 1,208th straight game, moving to third on baseball's all-time list behind Lou Gehrig and Everett Scott.

[80] Some felt that Ripken should have won the award: Tim Kurkjian called the vote a "crime", and Bobby Valentine stated that he was, "embarrassed by the actions of my peers.

[97] Ripken achieved a personal milestone on July 10, when he collected his 2,000th career hit, during a game at Oriole Park at Camden Yards against Wilson Álvarez of the White Sox.

[98] Because of Ripken's struggles, most managers and some sportswriters felt he should be left out of the All-Star Game in Baltimore that year; however, the fans gave him more than two million votes to ensure his spot.

[101] Before the 1994 season, the Elias Sports Bureau informed the Orioles that Ripken had surpassed Ernie Banks for most career home runs as a shortstop with his 278th on July 15 against Scott Erickson.

[102] Banks met Ripken at a ceremony on February 9 and said, "I'm extremely happy that he broke this record because it give me a chance to come back and be remembered too.

The Orioles erected special box seats for the game to raise money for the Johns Hopkins University to study Lou Gehrig's disease.

"[111] Reflecting on that evening after his election to the Hall of Fame, Ripken said, "Bobby Bonilla and Rafael Palmeiro pushed me out of the dugout and said, 'Hey, if you don't do a lap around this thing, we'll never get the game started.'

[112] Although he was injured at both the beginning and the end of the 1999 season and also mourned the loss of his father and former coach Cal Ripken Sr. only a few days before 1999's opening game, he hit 18 homers in 332 at-bats (one HR every 18.4 AB's).

[112][123][124][125] He had the best individual game of his career, going 6-for-6 with two home runs off John Smoltz and tying a club record with 13 total bases against the Atlanta Braves on June 13.

[128] He achieved the milestone early in the 2000 season in the April 15th game against the Twins at the Metrodome when he singled off reliever Héctor Carrasco; Eddie Murray, another member of the club and the Orioles' first-base coach, was the first to congratulate him.

[143] Along with his brother Billy, he formed the Cal Ripken Sr., Foundation in 2001 to give underprivileged children the opportunity to attend baseball camps around the country and learn the game.

[146] In 2007, Ripken, along with Andre Agassi, Muhammad Ali, Lance Armstrong, Warrick Dunn, Mia Hamm, Jeff Gordon, Tony Hawk, Andrea Jaeger, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, Mario Lemieux, and Alonzo Mourning founded Athletes for Hope, a charitable organization, which helps professional athletes get involved in charitable causes and inspires millions of non-athletes to volunteer and support the community.

[148] On August 13, 2007, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced that Ripken had been named Special Sports Envoy for the US State Department and that he would be going to China in October: "... we're just delighted that somebody of Cal Ripken's stature is going to be someone who will go out and represent America so well and represent what we consider to be American values, but universal values; that hard work and diligence and the willingness to really put it all on the line every day is something that kids need to learn", said Rice.

"[73] At 6 ft 4 in (1.93 m), 225 lb (102 kg), Ripken was a departure from the prototypical shortstop of the time—small, fleet-of-foot players who played a defensively difficult position but often did not post the home run and batting average totals that an outfielder might.

[62][155][156] Nonetheless, Ripken demonstrated the ability to play excellent defense at shortstop, and as a result remained a fixture there for well over a decade, leading the league in assists several times, winning the Gold Glove twice, and, in 1990, setting the MLB record for best fielding percentage in a season at his position.

[55][78][93] Though not a flashy fielder, Ripken displayed excellent fundamentals, and studied batters and even his own pitching staff so he could position himself to compensate for his lack of physical speed.

[161] The write-up in the 1996 Sporting News Baseball Guide, which was written shortly after Ripken set the record, called the streak "what almost everyone considered the high point of the major league season.

The others are Garvin and Granny Hamner for the Philadelphia Phillies in 1945; the twins Eddie and Johnny O'Brien with the Pittsburgh Pirates in the mid-1950s, and Frank and Milt Bolling for the Detroit Tigers in 1958.

Driver Bobby Labonte had a special paint scheme on his #18 Interstate Batteries car featuring Baltimore Orioles colors along with Ripken's retirement seal.

[179] After being released by the Nationals in March 2017, he signed with the Orioles and was assigned to the Aberdeen Ironbirds, which were owned by his father, and played at a stadium that carries the family name.

[185][186] Following his retirement, he wrote several more, including Play Baseball the Ripken Way: The Complete Illustrated Guide to the Fundamentals, also written by his brother Billy and co-authored by Larry Burke, in 2005.

[200] Though he had not purchased them, Ripken was quoted in a July 17, 2010, Associated Press article as saying he would consider rejoining the Orioles part-time as an advisor and full-time after his son graduated from high school in 2012.

[209][needs update] In January 2024, John P. Angelos reached a $1.725 billion deal to sell the Baltimore Orioles to a group led by David Rubenstein.