Posted on 10/07/2001 1:43:16 PM PDT by Sabertooth
Oh, bull. Everybody in baseball would be hitting 30+ homers a year if the ball was juiced. If you want to compare balls, parks, or eras, be my guest. With the swing he has this season, Barry would have hit 83+ in the Ruth or Marris era, easy. 450 ft. is 450 ft., now or then.
What you are missing is that modern athletes have a huge edge in nutrition (from birth on) and access to technology to study and improve their game. The Bonds swing of 10 years ago is very different from the poetry he strokes today.
Barry has studied and worked hard to refine his craft. He is your master. Viva Bonds!
I don't know about Rickey Henderson. When he played for Seattle last year, he seemed very well liked in the clubhouse. Also he accomplished something I wish I had caught on videotape: a slo-motion steal of 2nd base! He got picked off at 1st, and kept enticing the 1st baseman to try to tag him as he strolled towards 2nd. Finally he turned around & fell onto 2nd base.
I doubt I'll ever see that again!
Bobby Bonds
And next year, how about a new record: 100 HR?
Who's the ignoramus here? McGwire walked 162 times that season. Who cares how many were official intentional BBs?
(1) This record will get increasingly hard to break -- that sounds obvious, since the numbers keep getting higher, but what I mean is that the number of hittable pitches a batter receives is apparently inversely proportional to the rate of home runs hit. Bonds hardly ever got anything good to hit. He was so good, though, that anything connected was flying out of the park this year. Basically, the idea is this: anybody who hits like this won't get anything good to hit, period. That fact will make it that much harder for anyone to approach 73 again.
(2) The word "Andro" never came up this year. Kinda removes some of the stigma attached to McGuire's mark. (3) Nobody drowned out there is McCovey cove as the kayak armada grew in size.
That's what they used to do -- juice it once every six or seven years. (1987, I think -- it's the year Wade Boggs suddenly started hitting home runs.) But in 1994, when thery dfid it, the strike came. So, the Lords of Baseball used the excuse, the fans are deserting us in anger, so let's keep it. And the next thing you knew, like wartime rent control in New York City, an "emergency" practice became the norm. The Lords are contemptuous of dyed-in-the wool fans (how many jackasses do you meet today, who will tell you that these inflated numbers are the result of talent?), and addicted to the rabbit ball. I don't see "straight" balls making a comeback any time soon.
Hey, Rusty! See post #76.
And Bonds is similar personality-wise to Williams, plus Bonds, like Williams, was not renowned for post-season excellence. The analogy will really jell if Bonds were to be robbed of the MVP award for some reason (Williams hit .406 in 1941 and lost the MVP title to Joe DiMaggio, with his 56 game hitting streak.)
Not commenting on the column, just on Gammons.
Next time you open your wallet, take a look at the twenty-dollar bill. Doesn't Peter Gammons look like good old Andrew Jackson?
Although I haven't seen any scientific evidence for juiced baseballs. And there have been some inquiries.
I've said elsewhere that I think that things happen in cycles. Remember in the 80s, when you pretty much had to steal 100 bases to lead the league?
It had only been done twice before that... Maury Wills with 104 in 1962, and Lou Brock with 118 in 1974.
Now you don't see it anymore. Were the baserunner's cleats juiced? ;^)
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