We are living in some very questionable times as far as baseball is concerned and the issue of steroids once it goes away might return baseball to it’s original mode of more fundamental style of play.

By Amaury Pi-GonzálezWe are not that far away from a style of baseball like the Baby Boomers grew up with, more base-to-base, stealing,run and hit, fundamental
play and less home runs. If you are over 50 years of age or close to it, you know what I mean.

Once the ‘Steroids era’is gone there is enough evidence to point to-the-way that we will have less home runs and more of the fundamentally style of
game that we saw, for example during the World Baseball Classic finals between Japan and Cuba.
Speed will play a much more important part, the
art of hitting would be back and you will not see some shortstops hitting home runs of over 450 feet in distance.

There is a reason why Rafael Palmeiro(although he can still hit)doesn’t have a job, there still a reason why Sammy Sosa retired prior to this 2006 baseball season and even when Bonds is said and done with whatever number of home runs he finished with he still would have to deal with the investigations, the books, the IRS, the perception of how come since 1998 he became stronger when most sluggers decrease their productivity after age 38.

I remember interviewing Hank Aaron in Oakland in June 1976. Aaron took Athletics reliever Jim Todd
for a home run over the left field fence, it was
Aaron’s 750. It was June 18, 1976, after that Aaron would hit 5 more and ended his career
on top with 755 home runs. I even have a very nice color photograph as I interviewed Aaron at the
Oakland Coliseum taken by an old friend who was the oficial Topps Cards photographer. There are still a bunch of reporters here in the Bay Area that
witnessed that 750th home run by Aaron in Oakland. We didn’t know how many he would finish with at the time. And only 4,108 fans at the Oakland Coliseum watched. But everybody knew it was something very special.

However, Aaron didn’t have to deal with all these
investigations. The main concern over Hank Aaron
as he pursued Ruth’s record was his personal security. If you watch ESPN “Bonds on Bonds”
(which by the way got terrible ratings) you didn’t see anything as far as threatening letters were concerned. Many people wrote Aaron in descriptive fashion how they were going to kill him. When Aaron tied and broke Babe Ruth’s record he was playing for the Atlanta Braves in the deep south in the 1970s where racial attitudes were still “tense”.
Barry Bonds is lucky to play in one (if not the most)tolerant city in the United States. And yes, I like
to believe there is no racism left in this country but
I we all know that is not true.

When Hank Aaron hit his 750 home run in Oakland,
there was no ESPN 1 or 2, no CNN, FOX or anything like that. It was baseball writers locally and nationally, radio stations and the usual television stations. In those days not every game was televised, there was no Sportschannel or
SportsCenter. You could see Aaron in person at the games or during the 6 or 11PM newcasts Sports
segments and of course, reading the papers.
The internet, the cell phones, e-mails and Ipods were in a Galaxy Far Far Away….and yes, you still had to stand up to change your television channel.
(Wonder why 60% of Americans are over weight?)

During the days of Hank Aaron the main concern was that racist could hurt him. If Barry Bonds got threatening letters, they are nothing compared to
what Aaron received. When Aaron tied and broke Babe Ruth record he was playing for the Braves in Atlanta in the deep South were(let’s say) people are less tolerant that in San Francisco.

There might be two players today with the potential of reaching the 700 home run plateau. Alex Rodríguez of the Yankees and Albert Pujols of the
Cardinals. Ten years ago Ken Griffey Jr was the man that many pointed as the one with a great chance of reaching Ruth and maybe even Aaron,
but Griffey Jr never met a fence he didn’t like to bang into and he has been hurt more times than
I can say jonrón.

As the Steroids era dissapears into the past baseball will return to the days where more strategy was needed and the power hitters were limited to maybe one (two) per team. And these
years of 60, 70 home runs by individuals will be something extremely difficult to break.

This change will take time, but it will happen and
just like Hurrricanes and Tsunami’s and Earthquakes are cyclical, so is baseball.
Albert Pujols(arguably the best player in baseball today) has 18 home runs prior to the action on this
May 12 and we might have a “Pujol’s watch”come September at this pace he could challenge
Barry Bonds season record of 73.

However, the trend would be for more speed and less power in the future, more fundamental baseball and less 3-run home runs and more hit
and run.