Steroids and 50 home run seasons..........

Well, now that Mr. "I Don't Want To Talk About The Past" McGwire is back on the scene, the question of steroids and other PED'S will be bantered about yet again. His stunning (note tongue firmly implanted in cheek) revelation and admission in Studio 42 with Bob Costas had all the melodrama of a bad episode of General Hospital. I was particularly taken by his lies within his truths. He never took them to gain strength? Really? Really Mark? This is disheartening beyond words for McGwire seemed so real, so genuine! Who can forget the images? Raising up his son as he crossed home plate? Embracing the Maris family? And so on, and so on.

My most favorite claim however is the assertion that these drugs did not help him hit more home runs! Is he really that diluted? Is he really so self absorbed that he cannot step outside himself, for the briefest of moments, to see the truth? The sad part is that he is not alone, he is merely another pony riding the hubris carousel not accepting responsibilty for his actions and what those actions have caused.

I have rolled this issue round and round in my brain and I have tried and tried to dismiss it as another version of simply gaining the edge. I want to place it in the same category as the spit ball, or Gaylord Perry's vaseline ball or even Whitey Ford, with the help of Yogi Berra, loading the ball up with mud. Hell, I have even tried to fluff it off as simply the 90s version of "Greenies".

Perhaps it's the freak show aspect to all of this that will not allow my mind to accept it as thus. Maybe Barry Bonds head growing to ridiculous proportions is just too much for my mind to comprehend. His feet growing five sizes when he was almost 40 is a concept that my mind cannot get wrapped around either. The reality is that if this happened 100 years ago, he'd be the feature act in a traveling circus freak show, along with the bearded lady and Tom Thumb.

So what I did was turn to history. Often it is history that will reveal truths lost in our day to day mundane existence. It is in history where will will often find the future. So travel with me now to those thrilling days of yesteryear to help us sort out the nonsense of today.

In the entire history of baseball, there have been only 41 times that a player has hit 50 or more home runs in a season and this has been accomplished by a grand total of only 25 players. There are nine players who have accomplished this monumental feat multiple times.

The first man to do it was, of course, The Bambino. Babe hit 54 in 1920 and before the decade ended he had done it three more times including his 60 in 1927. He hit 59 in 1921 and 54 again in 1928. The decade of the 1930s produced four more 50 home run seasons: Hack Wilson of the Cubs hit 56 in 1930, Jimmie Foxx (The Beast) hit 58 in 1932 with the Athletics and 50 in 1938 for the Red Sox becoming the first player to accomplish the feat with two different teams and the second player to do it more than once. The Tigers Hank Greenberg slugged 58 round trippers in 1938 making that the first year two players did it in the same season. The 1930s brought us the first version, if you will, of the juiced baseball allowing others, other than The Babe to emerge as monster home run hitters.

The 1940s saw it occur three times and twice in the same season. Ralph Kiner of the Pirates and Johnny Mize of the Giants each slugged 51 homers in 1947 to tie for the National League home run title. Kiner duplicated the effort in 1949 when he hit 54 dingers on his way to seven consecutive National League home run crowns. The fifties saw it happen but twice. Willie Mays jacked 51 in 1955 and Mickey Mantle hit 52 in 1956 as part of his Triple Crown season. Both of these greats would duplicate their efforts in the 60s. Mantle ended with 54 in his race to 60 home runs with teammate Roger Maris in 1961 and Mays bombed 52 in 1965. Maris , of course, captured the Holy Grail with his 61 homers in 1961.

Following Mays' 52 home runs in 1965, the 50 home run season took it's longest hiatus since it had first occured. It would be 12 years before George Foser of the Cincinatti Reds clubbed 52 homers in 1977. It would then take 13 more years before the Tigers gargantuan first baseman Cecil Fielder would hit 51 in 1990. In seven decades, this remarkable feat had been accomplished but 18 times by only 11 players. All that was about to change and change dramatically!

Since 1990, the 50 home run plateau in a single season has been reached 23 times by 14 different players. Excluding Fielder's 1990 season, there were 11 times that a player hit 50 or more home runs in a season in the decade of the 90s alone. Albert Belle cracked 50 for the Indians in 1995. The incomparable Brady Anderson banged 50 the following year for the Orioles and Greg Vaughn hit 50 on the button with the Padres in 1998. In Seattle, Ken Griffey Junior had back to back 56 homer campaigns in 1997 and 1998, a remarkable achievemnet which was swallowed up by a guy named Sosa and another named McGwire. "Big Mac" bashed 52 in 1996, 58 in 1997, 70 in 1998 and 65 in 1999. "Slammin Sammy" banged out 66 in 1998 and 63 in 1999 becoming the only man in history to hit 60 home runs in a season and not lead the league. And he did it in back to back seasons!!

The twenty first century brought more of the same. Sosa had his third consecutive 50 homer campaign with 50 in 2000. The 2001 season brought four more 50 homer seasons and three new members to the fraternity, with Alex Rodriquez clubbing 52, Luis Gonzalez hitting 57, and Barry Bonds jacking the ungodly sum of 73. Sosa hit another 64 homers becoming the only man in history to crack the 60 mark three times and still it was not enough to capture the home run crown.

From 2002 through 2007, the half century in homer mark was hit seven more times. Alex Rodriquez did it two more times when he hit 57 in 02 and 54 in 07. The other five times added five new faces to the 50 home run parade. Jim Thome hit 52 in 02, Andruw Jones, 51 in 05, David Ortiz 54 in 06, Ryan Howard, 58 in 06 and in 2007, Prince Fielder hit 50 duplicating his dad's effort seventeen years earlier. This marked the first time a father, son duo accomplished the feat.

So for the purposes of recapping; from 1920-1990, 11 players did it 18 times or roughly every four years. From 1995-2007, 14 players have done it 23 times or roughly two players per season! Jose Canseco marks 1988 as the year he began hitting the juice and introducing and injecting it into teammates including Mark McGwire. Is this a coincidence? Probably not.

The list of players who have achieved this plateau since 1995 is rife with players who have been linked to or have admitted taking steroids. At the top of the admission list are ARod and McGwire. Sammy Sosa has long been suspected of hitting the juice. His sudden inability to comprehend English may have been a side effect of excessive steroid use. Greg Vaughn lived with Ken Caminiti in 1996, what is the liklihood that he dabled? David Ortiz appeared on "the list" in 2009 and then of course there's Bonds. Never proven but ask yourself this question, If a man had a gun to your head and said if you do not answer this question correctly I will pull the trigger and then he asked you "Did Barry Bonds take steroids"? What would your answer be? I don't know about you but I'm going with a big yes! Andruw Jones had a curious response to questions about Bonds when Barry surpassed Hank Aaron in career home runs. He said "What difference does it make if he took steroids, lots of people do and they don't hit 755 homers", interesting. Albert Belle is linked to just about anything and everything bad. I'm surprised he hasn't been questioned in the Kennedy assassination. And then of course there are Brady Anderson and Luis Gonzalez. Lets see, throughout Anderson's career, he averaged a home run for every 30.95 at bats. In 1996 he jacked one out of the park every 11.58 at bats. How do you think he became Ruthian in his home run production? As for LuGo, a similar surge, he went from doinking a dinger in every 25.87 at bats to the astonishing rate of every 10.68 trips to the plate.

Of the newcomers to the list, it appears as if only Griffey, Thome, Howard and Prince Fielder are "legitimate" contenders to the 50 home run crown. If you eliminated all the of the players who appear to have subscribed to the theory of more power through chemistry, it would total but 15 players and it would have occured 22 times since The Babe did it in 1920. That comes down to, roughly, once every 3 1/2 years. A little better than the previous seasons but that could be legintmally linked to more knowledge of nutrition, the body and legitimate workout regiments.

The last 50 home run season was 2007 when both Alex Rodriquez and Prince Fielder topped the mark. In 2008, Ryan Howard fell two home runs short and last year Albert Pujols led the majors with 47. In the American League, there were no 40 home run seasons the past two years. One has to go all the way back to 1991 (Howard Johnson, Mets 38) and 1992 (Fred McGriff Padres 35) to find back to back years where the league home run leaders did not reach the 40 home run plateau. If nobody hits 50 homers this season, it will mark the first time in nearly 20 years (1991, 92 and 93) that the majors will be without a 50 home run hitter for three straight seasons.

Is the recent reduction in the 50 homer season a result of better drug testing? That question will be determined and perhaps best answered a decade or two hence. If the the 50 home run season continues to appear at the rate it has for nearly a century. (about 1 every 3 1/2 to 4 years) one might logically conclude that chemistry played the larger role in the 1990s escalation. If, however, more and more 50 home run seasons appear and from more and more "unlikely" sources one might conclude that todays players are simply bigger, faster and stronger. Or, there's something else out there that as of yet is undetectable. A thought I'd simply rather not ponder!

The Man They Call Yaz

I begin this venture with a story of Carl Yastrzemski. The son of a Long Island potato farmer this man, of Polish decent, was the epitome of the meaning of the term work ethic. I am not here to chronicle his career, (peek into baseballreference.com for that) nor am I here to analyze his stats and numbers. Rather in this entry I will try to explain how enormously clutch he was as a player.

The Boston Red Sox tale of their "Impossible Dream" season of 1967 is well documented and chronicled. The "Cardiac Kids" came from ninth place the year before and captured the American League pennant, by a single game, the last weekend of the season by sweeping the mighty Minnesota Twins in a two game set at Fenway. Yaz went seven for eight, hit his 44th home run of the year, had 6 RBI and scored twice, that last weekend of the season. In fact for the entire month of September and into Oct 1st, Yaz hit .417 with 8 homers and 24 RBI. The Sox went 16-11 through that stretch. More incredibly is the fact that he closed out the season with a 10 game hitting streak in which he hit .541 (20-37) with 4 home runs and 14 RBI. The Red Sox manager during that season was the Hall of Famer Dick Williams. Dick is 81 years old and he will tell you to this day that in all his years both in and watching baseball, Carl Yastrzemski in 1967 was the greatest player he ever saw!!!

It is difficult to assess one's "clutchness" if you will. We all know what it is, yet it is difficult to quantify. We can look at certain numbers, the sabermetriticians have created a whole new world of analyzing and calculating "the numbers". Those of us not so adept, need no numbers. All we need know is when our club is in a tight spot and the opposition is at the plate, who do we NOT want to step in the batter's box? It's as simple as that. Do the fans of Yankee opponents want to see Derek Jeter at the plate in a key spot? Of course not. How about those Cub fans sitting at Wrigley on a nice sunny afternoon. Do they want Pujols stepping in with two on in the top of the 8th and their beloved Cubbies ahead 4-2? I doubt it!! Or how about the 2004 Red Sox and that David Ortiz fellow. You remember him. All "Large Father" did then was pick up the Red Sox and their nation and placed it on his shoulders to carry them from their 86 year residence in the pit of despair!

All formidable examples. All with the numbers to back it up. However I will say that there never has been a player in my 50 years of watching baseball who can eclipse the clutchness that was Yaz in 1967! During the 1990s my son, began playing Little League. A devotee of the game, even at a young age he possessed a marvelous interest and curiosity regarding baseball history. When he was nine years old he asked me "dad, how good was Yaz"? I explained it thus.

When the Red Sox defeated the Twins on Saturday Sept 30, 1967, it created a deadlock atop the American League. The whole season was about to come down to one game on Sunday. At midnight, my dad and I headed into Boston. We went to mass (it was Sunday after all) at 3 AM on Arch St in Boston and headed on over to Fenway and the ticket booth. There were only four people in line in front of us and and when the windows flew open, WE GOT TICKETS!!!! We went into the park as soon as it opened. I can still smell the cigar smoke and feel the electrical charge that hovered over that marvelous ball yard. Making our way to a couple of seats about halfway up the third base grandstand we chose two, sat down and miraculously we were there when the game began. Was it possible that we would sit here the entire game? Unfortunately no, the true patrons arrived after the top half of the first inning. Moving to the standing section behind the grandstand, I shimmied up a pole and made my way out onto the stanchions in the third base roof, I wrapped myself around a girder and hunkered down to watch history.

The Twins took a 1-0 lead in the first inning on an error by George Scott, the Red Sox Golden Glove first baseman. They stretched it to 2-0 in the third on another error. This time by of all people Yaz! Was it possible that fate would deal the cruelest of blows? Errors by the two best defensive players on the team would lead to the undoing of this most wondrous of seasons?

The score remained 2-0 until the bottom of the sixth. Pitcher Jim Lonborg led off with a bunt single. That was followed by singles from Jerry Adair and Dalton Jones and with the bases loaded Yaz strutted to the plate. His left hand tugged at his belt as he stepped in to the box, bat cocked high above his head, he glared out at the Twins hurler Dean Chance. Chance's first pitch was a fastball down and in for ball one. His next fastball caught a little bit too much of the plate and the mighty Yaz uncorked his swing.

Those who teach players how to hit a baseball will tell you that the prefect swing and the prefect connection between baseball and bat will drive a pitched ball right back up the middle. Well Yaz's swing sent Chances fastball on a line over the left part of the second base bag. In fact, he had hit the ball so cleanly, it barely made a sound and as Lonborg and Adair came around to score, the game was tied. Yet I must say, there was a twinge, ever so slightly, but a twinge none the less, of disappointment for Yaz had not homered. Think about that! A perfectly hit baseball which was his third hit of the day, his fifth hit in a row and it tied the score in the biggest Red Sox game in 21 years. Yet you truly expected him to hit a homer! THAT IS HOW GOOD YAZ WAS IN 1967!

My nine year old son understood what I was saying. He got it. It provided a measure of just how clutch was "The Man They Call Yaz"!!! Eleven years later, in 2004, that little boy was now 20 and he watched the wonder that was David Ortiz. He was away at college and we talked often during the Red Sox miracle of "04". In game four of the Yankees series, Ortiz had homered in the 12th to keep the Red Sox alive and less than 24 hours later "Papi'" singled in the bottom of the 14th bringing the series to 3 games to 2. He called me after that game and asked, "Dad, is he close to Yaz in 67?" Yea Boom, close!