It sounded good at the time.
In the summer of 1998, when the great home run derby captivated America, and Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa were folk heroes, and baseball seemed to have regained its sway, here’s what I wrote.
“And in this magic home run summer, we have run home to baseball. We have had yet another moment of Ruth; mythical figures have made us crazy for the game all over again. Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa have socked a ball over the wall and a sport over the hump, just as Ruth did almost 80 years ago.”
Can I take it back?
Can I claim never to have fawned over McGwire and Sosa, names that today are no more revered than Cicotte and Gandil? Can I claim I had a fever that whole danged summer 10 years ago?
In 1998, we celebrated the home run like it never had been celebrated before. Not during Ruth, not during Mantle and Maris, not ever.
But now we know the truth, that those balls socked over the wall were jettisoned by doping, and those stratospheric numbers, 62 and 70 and 73, are as artificial as Sweet’N low.
And home runs have lost their wallop.
Manny Ramirez hit home run No. 500 the other day, and Ken Griffey Jr. followed not long after with No. 600, and time was, celebration would have swilled into the streets.
Milestone home runs were a big deal in America.
In 1971, when both Frank Robinson and Harmon Killebrew joined the 500 club, only nine other sluggers had scaled such heights.
Now the 500 club is more crowded than the concession line on 50-cent beer night.
Through 1983, 12 players had hit 500 home runs. Since then, 12 more have joined the list, including players like Jim Thome and Rafael Palmeiro, who rank somewhere south of Frank Robinson and Harmon Killebrew on the slugger scale.
Home runs have lost the ability to inspire us. We can thank Barry Bonds and the steroids, I suppose. When we don’t believe the numbers are legit, we don’t care. Like track and field records. Who cares how low they go?
Who cares anymore how high the home run numbers go? When Bonds broke Henry Aaron’s record last August, everyone beyond McCovey Cove yawned.
And even when an unsoiled star launches a majestic-number ball, baseball fans largely are unmoved.
Griffey, a sympathetic figure in the great steroid morality play, drew little national attention for No. 600. ESPN got a little excited over Ramirez’s 500th, but that’s because ESPN convulses over anything Red Sox or Yankees.
Six hundred is an epic number. That’s the number of Ruth and Aaron and Mays, and McGwire and Sosa, the faux heroes of ‘98, also coming close to or cracking that ceiling shouldn’t take away from future feats.
But it does. Griffey, not Bonds, deserved the crown of modern home run king. Griffey, not Bonds, deserved the run at Ruth and Aaron, a run we now know would have failed but would have been fun to watch.
The huge numbers simply don’t mean anything anymore. Too many prodigious sluggers. Too many steroid tales.
There are no more moments of Ruth.
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