Why All the Home Runs?, By: Dave Sheinin
Record Pace Begets the Usual Suspects: Juiced Players, Juiced Balls, Weak Pitching
April 23, 2006; Washington Post
It was inevitable, one suspects, that the remarkable rise in offensive numbers in the early part of the season would lead to a revival of that oldest and stalest of conspiracy theories: the Juiced Ball.
The theory, as it applies to this season, goes like this:
With a tougher steroid policy now in place, and with amphetamines now also banned, Major League Baseball needed to do something to prevent a bunch of soccer scores -- 1-0, 2-1, etc. -- from creeping into the game and turning off fans who dig the long ball. The league also wanted to prove the impact of steroids over the previous decade was really not so great, the theory goes, so they sent special operatives to the manufacturing plant in Costa Rica over the winter to make sure this year's supply of baseballs was wound tighter.
Or something like that.
"Maybe," Cubs Manager Dusty Baker joked to the Chicago Tribune recently, "the ball is on steroids."
It is true that the first three weeks of the season have produced some eye-popping numbers -- beginning with the fact that, through Thursday, there have been an average of 2.48 homers hit per game, which, if it were to keep up, would obliterate the record of 2.34 per game set in 2000.
The league-wide batting average of .271 through Thursday, is up seven points from the final total of 2005 and would equal the 1999 season for the highest of the last half-century.
Only three teams in history (the 1999 Mariners, 2005 Rangers and 1996 Orioles) have hit 250 or more homers in a season, but this year five teams (Reds, Tigers, Braves, Blue Jays and Yankees) entered the weekend on pace to exceed that figure. Likewise, while the 1999 Indians are the only team in the last 50 years to score more than 1,000 runs, three teams (Reds, Indians and Yankees) are on pace to exceed 1,000 this season.
Still, to pin this offensive explosion on a juiced ball is not only silly, but lazy. Remember, in the late 1990s, when a bunch of obviously muscle-bound sluggers fueled a similar offensive surge, the first inclination was to blame a juiced ball -- when it appears likely that it was juiced players.
If the cynic in you wants to find something to blame this year, you could do worse than looking again at performance-enhancing drugs. Despite Commissioner Bud Selig's recent proclamation that baseball had "solved" its steroid problem, experts on drug policy scoff at that notion. Among other loopholes in the current policy, baseball does not currently test for human growth hormone.
"Calling this the 'post-steroids era,' to me, is gross negligence," said Charles Yesalis, a Penn State professor and leading expert on steroids in sports. "That there are loopholes in this policy is a well-established fact. . . . The decline [in 2005] was probably just a learning curve" regarding the new policy.
Also remember that less than one-tenth of the season has been played. Chances are, things will even out over the summer -- particularly if the amphetamine ban leads to more days off for starting players.
There are plenty of other logical reasons for home runs -- and offense in general -- to rise this season:
· Unseasonably warm weather in the Midwest and east this month. Warmer weather causes the ball to carry farther.
· Pitchers off the juice. Don't forget that exactly half of the 12 players busted thus far for steroid violations have been pitchers. If pitchers are getting off the juice, it stands to reason that hitters would benefit.
· Awful pitching. Just look at all the teams with No. 5 starters masquerading as No. 3s. You know who you are.
