Miami Marlins outfielder Giancarlo Stanton was named the National League Player of the Month for June on Thursday.

Stanton dominated opposing pitchers in the month and hit home runs at a prolific rate. Despite missing the last few days of the month due to injury, Stanton had 12 home runs and 23 runs batted in. A broken hand sidelined the star after Friday's loss, but his stats were good enough for the monthly award.

In the month, Stanton also hit .344 which was a vast improvement over his start to the year. All year long Stanton had been mashing home runs, but at the same time had a lackluster batting average. In June, Stanton put together solid at-bats and provided more than just power.

When he went down with the hand injury, Stanton sat atop the MLB leader boards in both HR and RBI. Despite being out of action for nearly a week, Stanton is still leading in home runs and is near the top in runs batted in.

This is the second time in Stanton's career that he has taken home Player of the Month honors. Back in May of 2012, the slugger also was given the prestigious honor. That month, Stanton posted numbers that were very similar to this June with his .343 batting average to go along with 12 HR and 30 RBI.

Earlier this year, Stanton also was named of the Player of the Week on June 14th. That marked the third time in his career that the 25-year old won weekly honors.

Stanton should be able to return in early August, and could also end up being named to the All-Star Game despite being unable to play.