Home Run Lovers Will Have a Blast

We were told not to be greedy. Don’t expect an encore. The home run derby of 1998 was supposed to be an aberration, a once-in-a-lifetime handshake with history. Then the new baseball season began in earnest Monday with an 11-game schedule and 38--count them, 38!--balls left the yard, including one missile off the bat of some guy named McGwire. Perhaps you’ve heard of him. Red hair. Pop-eye forearms. Tortellini-shaped eyes.

He kept fans in St. Louis deadbolted to their seats through two lengthy rain delays Monday night, then--amid the now- glimmer of camera strobes--he rewarded them by launching a solo shot to right-centerfield. The ball was hammered so hard it looked almost misshapen, as it smeared toward the rightfield stands, its trajectory low and hard and unyielding as it rode off toward the seats.

“Last year is over with. Turn the page,” McGwire said.

Not a chance. Not after Monday.

If last season’s home run binging and this year’s opening day proved anything, it’s that baseball’s long-ball bonanza is unlikely to end anytime soon. The relevant factors--more bandbox ballparks, a preponderance of lousy pitching, and an unprecedented emphasis on going for the fences--all remain in place, just as they did when McGwire shattered Roger Maris’ major-league record of 61 homers by clouting 70 a year ago.

On Monday, McGwire’s scythe-like swing looked as grooved as ever. His sublime foil, Chicago Cubs star Sammy Sosa, has shown no signs of tapering off, either, even if Sosa did report to camp this year lugging 14 pounds of leftovers from the banquet circuit and, to his surprise, didn’t fit in his size-34 baseball pants. “It’s all muscle,” Sosa insisted as a Cubs clubhouse attendant handed him a size 35. And everyone guffawed. Until Sosa slammed 12 spring-training home runs, three more than McGwire.

When asked during his spring rampage if he could match or better his 66 homers of 1998, Sosa smiled and said, “Nothing’s impossible.”

But don’t be surprised if it’s not a two-man race toward 70 anymore.

As last season proved, you don’t have to have McGwire’s Bunyanesque build or Sosa’s swing-from-the-heels stroke to clear today’s pulled-in fences or to knock out those badminton shuttlecocks that some of today’s pitchers are serving up as their best stuff. Over-expansion is sullying modern pro sports (all of them) just as much as high salaries or bad attitudes. If folks in some franchise-bereft burg want pro baseball or football or whatever, I wish once--just once--some sports commissioner would declare, “Let them get cable!” Not “How much is it worth to you?”

Last season, eight men hit 40 or more homers in the American League alone. In the National League, Greg Vaughn launched 50. Which is fine. But a work-in-progress such as Vladimir Guerrero or--worse--Jeromy Burnitz each smacked 38. There’s just no nice way of saying this: Some of today’s pitchers have as much guile as a pitching machine. I’m particularly thinking of Colorado Rockies starter Pedro Astacio, who was trotted out 35 times last season despite his 6.23 ERA. How about former Seattle Mariners reliever Bobby Ayala, the Human Fire Accelerant? A man who gives new meaning to the term “hurler.” (How did Ayala keep that job so long? Because other pitchers didn’t want to deal with the rain in Seattle? Because the weather gives Ayala seasonal affective disorder, and the collective-bargaining agreement says you can’t fire a guy for that?)

To be fair, the home run cascade is not just the pitchers’ fault. Some of today’s so-called sluggers are fattening their totals in stadiums where you only need a 9-iron to hit the seats.

So why can’t someone hit 70 again? Or 75? And why stop there?

Albert Belle hit 50, 48, 30 and 49 home runs the last four years. This season, he moved to the Baltimore Orioles and Camden Yards, where the right field corner is just 318 feet away. Monday, Belle had a bloop home run to right. Ken Griffey Jr., who twice has smashed 56 homers playing in Seattle’s Kingdome, could benefit from the club’s move into an outdoor ballpark at midseason. He also had a home run Monday. Next year, Barry Bonds and the Giants move into a park where the rightfield foul pole will be just 308 feet away.

Like Sosa, Anaheim’s Mo Vaughn began the season Tuesday night already behind in the home run race.

Home runs used to be mystical, magical things. But that was before. That was back when Pittsburgh’s Forbes Field measured 460 feet to center, or well-struck shots would die in the far reaches of Death Valley at Yankee Stadium. Now that the mental barrier of passing Maris’ 61 is gone for today’s hitters, pitchers might need chiropractors to fix the whiplash they’ll get from snapping around to watch their pitches fly out. Even Kevin Brown, the Dodgers’ $105-million man, surrendered three homers Monday after giving up only eight all last season.

So turn the page? Not a chance. As Milwaukee pitcher David Weathers, the guy who served up McGwire’s first shot of the season, said Monday, “Welcome to 1999.”