Alex Rodriguez, The All-Time Greatest Home Run Hitters, And The Death of Statistics

No other sport better lends itself to statistical analysis and for a young boy this is a phase – usually right after dinosaurs, before girls – where we first learn the secret language of baseball.

In this phase (mid ‘90s), I created a whole league (think AAU-type – post little league, pre draft) where the best high school kids in the country competed against each other. I’d simulate games using a tennis ball and foam bat in my parents’ bedroom (the only large enough area indoors). Then I’d tally up the statistics and create box scores and season stat leaders just like the Houston Chronicle did.

In retrospect, I’m pretty sure half those guys were on steroids.

We know with some certainty that Ken Griffey, Jr. was clean. And God bless that guy for all he meant to baseball for I hope history will treat him more kindly than his more publicized peers who overshadowed much of Griffey’s career.

Colin Cowherd disagrees. Griffey Jr. wore his cap backwards, which demonstrates his immaturity. I shit you not. He actually used Griffey as an example to prove his ridiculous backwards-cap theory.

I enjoyed watching Rodriguez haplessly toil away in 40+ at bats while NYY fans snapped pictures with every swing. A-Rod, Haynesworth, Favre…..it’s been a good couple of weeks for rooting against guys.

I saw where Dick Vitale took the position on Twitter earlier that he would only acknowledge 4 guys as having hit 600+. There will be plenty of media, fans & the like that take that position. Let’s hope they’re all as vocal as Dickie V.

I don’t pay any attention to baseball—I view it as a sport, like tennis, skiiing, and other sports that only help get me from the end of March Madness to the start of college football again. But there was a time when Mike White and I played baseball in his backyard using a baseball book that listed the stats of every single player in MLB history—we’d pit the 1930’s Cardinals vs the 1920’s Yankees and played hundreds (thousands?) of nine-inning games. Great stuff. We were using PED’s too, but we called it Tang.

I wonder if it’s reasonable to write off the power hitters of today completely, though. I think it’s worth doing some comparison to their peers (who are presumably articially-enhanced), or recognizing that pitchers have clearly also benefited from PED’s. So maybe the numbers are inflated, but not as much as folks sometimes espouse. I wonder if I used that word correctly. Probably not.

I’m pretty sure every baseball computer game I, or my friends, ever owed, took steroids into account. In Micro League Baseball (circa 1987), Ernie Banks hit 65 home runs for me. In Sammy Sosa High Heat 2001, I had a computer generated player on my team that hit 121 home runs one season, and finished his career with 1,310 home runs.

Beautiful, brilliant, finally somebody who gets it and can explain it. You are so talented.

Statistics were a common language throughout the eras.

Isn’t that just because people didn’t know better? Should Hank Aaron be compared to Babe Ruth when Ruth never had to face a black guy (except in that pick up game in Lehane’s “The Given Day”)? Should McGwire be compared to Aaron when Aaron didn’t have to face specialty pitchers who throw 95? Statistics don’t translate well between eras. They never have. Comparing players between eras relying on simple stats is a fool’s errand. It always has been.

I love baseball statistics, but you have to be able to put context to the story they tell. I feel no angst over the PED home run hitters – that’s the era they’re from.

I dont give a shit if you are on drugs. Hitting 600 home runs in MLB is hard. If it wasn’t your list would be a lot, lot longer. It’s really really hard. That’s why statistics matter. They quantify why we like baseball – they tell us how often someone does something that is really difficult. How heroic our heros are. Fuck angst over drugs.

Phenom -
 
A common language doesn’t mean every word is identical. And yes, there is a reason baseball has an iconic pantheon of statistics because it, more than any other major sport, has statistics that did translate more readily across the eras.
 
Because the players do. Or did.
 
Bob Cousy couldn’t play modern college basketball much less in the NBA.
 
Willie Mays would still do just fine.
 
Mike Webster couldn’t start at Missouri, much less be a NFL Hall of Famer in Pittsburgh.
 
But Bob Gibson would be OK suiting up for the Royals.
 
I watch a clip of 1940s baseball and it’s fully and totally recognizable as the game played today, the changes you mention excepted (many of them societal changes reflected largely in all sport).
 
What other sport can you say that about?

Yes, hitting 600 home runs is really difficult. With or without drugs.
 
However, it became slightly less difficult when you could put on 40 pounds of muscle mass, recover more quickly from injury, play at a high level deep into your late 30s and early 40s and have those routine pop flies turn into four run homers.
 
I have zero patience for the idiotic “PEDs don’t help you hit a curve ball” crowd.

I don’t think basball realises how much toruble they are in. The younger generation (and even mine…age 25-35 or so) don’t have a love of baseball. We like it ok, but baseball is getting by on the 35-55+ crowd who grew up with a passion for it. That won’t exist in 20 years. They won’t be able to charge $75 a ticket and $8 a beer.

The cheating, over expansion, too many games, free agency, too expensive to attend, etc will finally catch up to them as their core audience starts to die off in 20-30 years. X-games, UFC, soccar, the other major sports, etc all have moved in on the baseball audience…and for good reaosn.

fear-the-cow -
 
Agree.
 
I’ve written many times – Sell baseball, tennis. Buy MMA, college football, NFL. Hold Soccer.

I agree with a lot of this, but it isn’t fair to say that statistics were common throughout the eras.

Think about this: In 1961, the leagues expanded, and the schedule was increased from 154 games to 162 games. When Roger Maris hit his 61st home run in the 162nd game of the season, I imagine all the bloggers back then were voicing the same complaints. (I think they were using geocities in the 60s.)

Anyway, now we know that Ruth hit all of his home runs in 154-game seasons. Would he have hit more than 60 in a season? Would he have hit more than 714 in his career? For sure. But we’ll never know. We just know that he hit his long balls in a different era — to say nothing of the park dimensions at the time.

I know it’s tempting to compare stats across baseball’s long history. But it’s not truly apples to apples. While the game itself hasn’t changed much, the way we play it has. Good luck finding another 500-game winner.

I agree that the HR record has lost its luster, and that does make me sad. But I also have to try to appreciate the achievements for what they are: impressive even within the confines of the steroid era.

Scip, I love baseball, but I don’t find the fact that it hasn’t evolved like other sports to be a reason to love it. Anyway, it’s evolved plenty. I recently watched a replay of the ‘85 world series and was struck by how little everyone was. Especially the pitchers. It was a big deal back then when a guy threw over 90. Now, over 95 is a big deal. That was only 25 years ago. I’m not sure how those ‘85 players would do these days. The game has changed. That said, I am indifferent to the change. And, the fact that someone from the ’60s may be able to compete today is, I agree, something unique to baseball, but it’s not something I find endearing. Baseball has been my favorite sport since I was four and I’ve enjoyed seen all kinds, which is great. Baseball is great.

But, I’m not the nostalgic type and don’t know why people get worked up over numbers. I mean, shit, 601 homers is more impressive than 600 but is ESPN going to break in to see those ABs? No. Because we love to celebrate round numbers! Yea, round numbers!

They’re all just numbers.

The cheating, over expansion, too many games, free agency, too expensive to attend, etc will finally catch up to them as their core audience starts to die off in 20-30 years.

I don’t get this. A) NFL players cheat a lot more and nobody cares, B) over expansion?, C) too many games? I want more. D) what’s wrong with free agency – if baseball fails because of it the rest of the sports will follow. Oh, and heaven forbid someone in America can choose where they want to work and negotiate a good deal for themselves to do so. E) attendance numbers keep going up as prices rise.

The sport may die off, but it won’t be for those reasons.

Russell -
 
With all due respect, I’m not writing a fucking legal brief or writing an academic thesis.
 
Baseball was different in 1978 from the game played in 1885? HOLY SHIT. I didn’t consider this! If the reader can’t evaluate the broader context without picking nits, then I’ll start footnoting everything I write to demonstrate that, I’m aware, in fact, that playing in peach orchards isn’t the same as Wrigley.
 
We’re all perfectly aware of the baseball season getting longer. Negro Leagues. Middle relief. No one is suggesting it’s apples to apples,
 
But, baseball, more than any other sport, was fruit to fruit. That’s why surpassing baseball milestones had meaning in baseball different from any other game, even within the context of Cy Young’s silly win total, and Ty Cobbs’ inflated batting average, and Josh Gibson never getting his break.
 
PEDs were a game changer.
 
6 of the 8 instances of players hitting over 60 home runs was on PEDs.
 
And both players that hit over 70 were on PEDs.
 
That’s 80% of your single season greatest slugger events over a four year window in a game that’s been played in recognizable fashion for 80+ years. And I’m being admonished about statistical naivete? Drug testing and scandal means It’s the year of the pitcher right now. Let me gently suggest that this is not a coincidence.

Something I’ve always wondered – why is Gaylord Perry in the Hall of Fame and portrayed as a loveable rube when every knows he cheated his way through the sport?

“So maybe the numbers are inflated, but not as much as folks sometimes espouse.”

Kev in 140 years of baseball a player hit 60 home runs in a season exactly twice. Then it happened six times in 4 years. That’s Weimar Republic style inflation.

I guess we’re not considering amphetamines PEDs… because they were around and prevalent during a lot of that era.

Moreover, I consider the Reggie Bar a PED, with it’s peanutty chocolaty goodness.

That’s fair, minn. Bonds (once), McGwire (twice), Sosa (thrice). 3 players out of how many in the league? I grant it’s an inflated stat—and I wasn’t aiming my comments at Scipio—but Babe Ruth hit over 50 homers 4 times, while the evil Barry Bonds did it once.

Here’s a stat question for someone with access and interest—how many homers per AB get hit these days vs earlier decades?

Players always look for an edge (paging Mr. Cobb). If you’re not buying the steroids don’t help with curveballs argument, you should also agree that amphetamines are PEDs. Mays and Aaron might be off your good list, then. Should we next talk about corking bats?

This isn’t easy for anyone to call, especially baseball itself. So everyone draws their own lines. I don’t think PEDs are the problem, per se. Imagine if McGuire, Bonds and Sosa didn’t all explode at once. Would the conversation be different now?

A-Rod isn’t the best role model, but you have to admit it means something when a shortstop hits 600 home runs at 35 years old. You can asterisk it all you want; it is still impressive.

That is the first time I ever read or heard the expression “four run homer”.

“Something I’ve always wondered – why is Gaylord Perry in the Hall of Fame and portrayed as a loveable rube when every knows he cheated his way through the sport?”

He was funny and likable. He was a winner (and he lost a lot of games, true). He didn’t cheat nearly so much as making batters think he was cheating, i.e., he was an uncommonly intelligent pitcher who leveraged whatever skills and angles he had available to him. He was not a “rube.”

“A-Rod isn’t the best role model, but you have to admit it means something when a shortstop hits 600 home runs at 35 years old. You can asterisk it all you want; it is still impressive.”

An especially noisome (yes, it means smelly) fart can be impressive.

My theory on all the no-hitters this year…

It is human nature to rise to the level of competition with which we are faced. I think the pitchers who were pitching to these exaggerated batting bots over the last 20 years had to necessarily get a lot better.

Now that the exaggerated batting bots don’t have their BIGSWING sauce, some of the pitchers are still playing at that raised level.

This is not to comment on the extent to which pitchers are/were juicing, just a comment that the boost was more for hitters and that pitchers had to learn to deal with that boost. Now they’re pitching to boostless hitters.

Also, not disputing, but… How did we know with virtual certainty that Griffey was clean? I’d like to think he was, but how do we know? What are you basing that on? I’m sure it’s something I’ve missed, and I’d like to know.

“An especially noisome (yes, it means smelly) fart can be impressive.”

Exactly. And if I used beans or assorted trans-fats to enhance my performance, my friends and family should still acknowledge the feat.

Kafka – don’t be a tool. The guy just explained a lot about the game better that some windbag like Gammons ever could and he’s not even a fan. Pretty sure he knows it’s called a quad homer.

This is really good stuff Scipio.

I like Ken Griffey a lot. Do you?

Thoughts on LANCE:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/05/sports/cycling/05armstrong.html?_r=1

Next to wrestling sizzlechest, dirtiest sport in the world?

The “but they didn’t have to play against black guys or foreigners” angle is so overplayed.

There were also only 16 teams in MLB. 8 teams in your league. That means Ruth and players in his era had to face the best pitchers in the league a lot more often. Add in a 4-man rotation, and you realize that Ruth faced Lefty Grove 5-6 times per year. Nowadays a hitter will face the best opposing pitcher in his league twice on average. I’m sure Ruth’s statstics would have been devastated if instead of facing the 1920s equivalent of 1999 Pedro Martínez 6 times he instead faced Martínez twice, 1999 Chan Ho Park twice, and 1999 Latroy Hawkins twice.

I used to be a huge baseball fans, even attending 31 home Rangers games in 1990. I pored over box scores every morning, and bought every Bill James publication. In the summer, any televised baseball game would do as background noise in the evening.

Not anymore, and the steroids are a huge part of it. Part of what appealed to me about the game was that baseball players looked like normal people- probably slightly taller than average, and toned for their weight (ha-ha! except for Thurman Munson leaning over the plate in pinstripes- looked like an egg!) but generally like regular guys. Unlike football or basketball, it was the sport where athletes differentiated themselves by their reflexes and commitment to drills rather than a statistically unique group of chromosomes givine them size and quick twitch fibers. Part of the charm was that a little guy who couldn’t hit could still play because he was a flawless fielder (Bowa, Belanger), or the struggle of the clumsy slugger to improve his fielding so he could get more than 200 at bats in a year. Now, every shortstop should hit 20- heck they’re all stronger than Mickey Mantle now anyway.

When shortstop Garry Templeton hit 20 HRs in a year (probably 2 of them inside the park), it meant something because he couldn’t muscle the ball over the wall. Stats freaks knew that the career HR totals were biased to the line drive hitters (Aaron, Mays, Williams) more than the looping sluggers (Kingman, Stargell). All around skill mattered more than pure muscle.

It’s a different game now. It’s about power more than skill. When it was a skill game, it’s competition was golf (btw- anybody notice that Tiger hasn’t won a major since the PGA started PED testing?). Now, as a power game, it’s competition is football and basketball.

As for the Gaylord Perry argument- whatever he did was in the full view of opponents, umpires and fans. If he got away with it, it was because he was a magician. And it actually was controversial electing him to the HOF.

“Babe Ruth hit over 50 homers 4 times, while the evil Barry Bonds did it once.”

You’re making the counter argument with this statement. This displays just how much PED’s help, thus rendering the “conversation between eras inarticulate.” That’s the entire piece in a nutshell. What was once a game of comparable play, no longer is.

I love the steroid apologists. They were in such devoted denial for the longest time. Many of you are on here. “It’s the stadiums!” “It’s the juiced ball!!” “It’s the dilluted pitching caused by expansion!!!”

Then everything comes to a head and it’s, “Who gives a shit, football players do it too!” I love this argument. It tells me that you have no idea why many of us LOVED this game. As Scipio pointed out, it is about the stats, because the sport itself damn sure isn’t easy on the eyes.

Fuck baseball with a 40 oz. Slugger covered by three donuts. Steroids ruined it for me. I only read this because I needed dump time reading material. If you must know, it wasn’t noisome.

Vlad Guerrero is clean too, though he’s from an overlapping generation. I can’t wait til Pujols gets caught.

A lot of pitchers threw over 90 mph in 85.

A) NFL players cheat a lot more and nobody cares

I had a conversation with a sportswriter not long ago that started as a conversation about doping in cycling. At some point he brought up the lack of outcry about steroids in the NFL and why does no one get up in arms about that when they crucify baseball players, track and field and cyclists? I’m surprised when people don’t get this. It’s simple, read Scipio’s post again. The statistical records are the foundation upon which the game of baseball has been built for more than a century. As Scip so eloquently explained, more than any other sport, the numbers can be compared across eras and the steroid era saw many of the most revered, and hallowed of these statistics threatened and even surpassed. The sporting public feels cheated and outraged that the icons and heroes of former eras are being passed up in the record books by undeserving cheats who stole the records by artificial means.

Quick, tell me how many passing TD’s Dan Marino has? How many career receiving yards does Jerry Rice have? A handful of people might know these numbers but most of us don’t pour over the stats in football like we do in Baseball. When it comes to football, if guys are taking steroids so they can be bigger, faster, and stronger that just means they crash into each other with even more speed and violence. There’s more entertainment in it for the fan if they all run a 4.5 and weigh 275.

Bonds is the all-time HR leader? That happened. And having so many PED users on the list from one era blows the uppers argument out of the water. The Mendoza line was invented in the era of cocaine and amphetamines. Hey, Joe D drank coffee!

The stain on the history of the game ensures a slow death of baseball. In 20 years, UFC 831 will dwarf the World Series in relevance.

Eskimo,

A buddy of mine played in the minors for several years in the early 80s, before the Canseco era. He said there were two pots of coffee in the clubhouse. Caffienated and methinated. .

Love Griffey but the thing that gives me pause in his case is all the injuries as his body broke down.

I think that happened prematurely and in many cases that is a signature of steroids. Hope it isnt true but he isnt in the clear to me.

How do you prove innocence? You really can’t. But Griffey:

1. Shows the traditional career cycle of improvement and decline, unlike Bonds, McGwire, Clemens et. al.’s second ramp up of improvement as baseball entered the steroid age.
2. Kept the same body type in his career.
3. Has not been attached to trainers, doctors, and labs associated with PEDs (this is how the vast majority of users are identified before testing positive).

bullzak, please elaborate on your point and give examples of baseball’s steroid users’ bodies breaking down. McGwire and Bonds don’t count, because they were old when their bodies started wearing out, just like old bodies do. They didn’t seem old, because the PEDs kept their performances up. Steroids sure didn’t break down Clemens body.

Maybe he’s talking about the time Griffey went into the wall wrist first at approximately mach 1, and his roided up wrist broke??

If anything, Griffey’s body broke down due to lack of work ethic and weight lifting. I mean, he became oft injured in his early 30’s. This has nothing to do with steroids. bullzak is in the vast minority that believes this, and by minority, I mean it’s just him.

I think football is ignoring a potentially serious problem. The steroid issue could catch up to them quickly in 2 ways…..

1. The more accepted it becomes that the gateway into pro football is steroid use, the more HS kids will experiment with them. Children harming themselves would have a major backlash.

2. Harder to imagine, but equally damaging, if pro football continues on the current track of specialization and tries to blend the line between entertainment and sport, then it will slowly transform. There is a precarious balance between football & WWF. Ignoring steroids may be enough to skew towards entertainment.

I don’t think MLB truly understands how bad steroids hurt the game. They will. If the NFL doesn’t learn from their example, they’ll be next.

Read the Mitchell Report and Juicing the Game.

There was a 2001 meeting of baseball team doctors where they told Commissioner Selig that there had been a 32% increase in players on the DL from 1992 to 2001 and that the average stay on the DL had increased 55%.

Their opinion was that it was because of steroids. I think it is pretty well established that once you overload your body with muscle you are more susceptible to connective tissue injuries.

The broken wrist was 1995. Dude missed 700+ games in 8 seasons in Cincy mostly with serious leg problems in the muscle and ligaments.

Obviously I dont have any proof one way or the other and he was one of the greatest players I ever saw but the types and severity of the injuries makes me wonder. I dont care whether people agree or not.

One teeny, tiny symptom of steroids are FUCKING MUSCLES. You know, like obvious changes in muscularity. Where were Jr.’s?

“I think it is pretty well established that once you overload your body with muscle you are more susceptible to connective tissue injuries.”

Yes, and your example, rather than being David Boston, is Ken Griffey Jr. Well done, Doctor!!

Jr. was lazy off the field, spending as much time as possible living it up in Jupiter, Fl. and getting by on his natural talent.

And I don’t care whether you care if we care, so there.

Oooh, an internet tough guy. Neat.

What if Lance Armstrong is using steroids? Are all steroids the same?

The guy tore his hamstring completely off the bone. That is a sign of overdevelopment of muscle.

Rafael Palmeiro looked like Lyle Alzado right?

I have my opinion, you have yours. Neither one of us will ever know for sure.

Internet tough guy? Uh, apparently you’re internet hypersensitive guy. Cuuuuute.

You’re coming off as ungrateful. You’re in the vast minority here, and I’m just trying to keep you from being laughed out of public if you ever voiced your opinion in a bar.

I’m telling you just how I would tell my closest friends if they were as wrong as you. Lighten up Frances.

Mag, I am not much of a conformist so I am fine with it. Laugh away.

If you were laughing in my face at a bar I would probably end up buying you a beer. But I would have to call you an asshole first.

And I admit I was being a chick. Not as much of a chick as Griffey will be when his nads shrivel up and fall off but still….

I’m such a nonconformist, I’ve decided to conform.

I would gladly accept the ‘asshole’ nametag, and the beer.

Good stuff to think about.

http://joeposnanski.si.com/2010/08/06/what-if-we-are-wrong-again-about-steroids/

If I was a better writer – or maybe getting paid – I would have written something like that.

Hi my family member! I want to say that this article is amazing, great written and come with almost all vital infos. I would like to see more posts like this .

Pretty great post. I simply stumbled upon your blog and wished to say that I have truly enjoyed surfing around your blog posts. After all I will be subscribing for your rss feed and I’m hoping you write again very soon!