Rant #1,961: Hit Me With Your Best Shot

Since this is Rant No. 1,961, I thought I would look at the year 1961, and since this week is "The Subway Series" in the New York Metropolitan Area, I thought I would stick with baseball for at least another Rant.

I was four years old in 1961, way too young to understand what was happening at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, although I do vaguely remember my father calling me over to the TV while Yankee games were on, and me whining and running away as I refused to see what all the commotion was about on TV.

In 1961, Yankees Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle set their sights on a then long-held record, that being Babe Ruth's 60 home runs in a season.

The two dueled down to the dwindling days of another pennant-winning and World Series-winning season, and were neck and neck until Mantle's injury curse caught up to him, and he had to bow out with "just" 54 homers.

The stage was Maris', and he took hold of that stage and yes, he hit his 61st home run into old Yankee Stadium's righfield porch, made a celebrity out of the ball's catcher, Sal Galante, and all that Maris took that magic season to hit those homers was a steady stream of nicotine from cigarettes.

Maris and Mantle were teammates, but Mantle was the fans' favorite to top the Babe. Maris was still considered something of an outsider, coming to the Yankees in a trade just a season before.

Maris had proven to be one of the game's most potent hitters, was an excellent outfielder, and did all the right things, but Mantle was the people's choice.

Not only did Maris smoke a lot of cigarettes during this chase of the Babe, but he also reportedly lost clumps of hair during the season related to the nerves he had as he climbed the ladder approaching the record.

He became a major focus of media during that period, and even without the social media that we have today, this quiet, soft spoken guy was pummeled by every newspaper, TV station, and radio station for comments and quotes about his most recent homer, his pursuit of the record, and just about everything else.

Once getting the record, it simply wasn't enough for baseball to celebrate such an accomplishment; it was ridiculed, because Babe hit his 60 in a 154 game season, Maris hit is 61 in a 162 game season, and actually "only" hit 59 in the 154th game of the season. It took him the full 162 games to get to 61.

The argument was a ridiculous one, but baseball purists--including then baseball commissioner Ford Frick--continued to believe that Ruth still had the record, and that Maris' 61 needed an asterisk to show that yes, he had the record but it did not stand up to what the Babe did.

Many of those purists were older, so they never had to contend with the steroid enhanced home run totals of players like Barry Bonds, Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire.

What would they have said to those home run totals?

One can only wonder.

Maris had quite a nice career, winning the MVP twice, but he never approached that season again statistics wise.

He is not in the Hall of Fame, he really should be, and maybe one day, he will get his place in that shrine.

For years, the Yankees did not know how to honor him, and he stayed away from the Stadium. In recent years, since his death, the Yankees have reached out to the family, and they have reached some type of balance. He has a plaque in Monument Park, and his number 9 has been retired.

Whatever the case, for one season, he could say that he did one better than Babe Ruth, unquestionably the greatest baseball player of all time.

In his later years, Maris even questioned himself, often saying it would have been better off if he never broke the record.

However, that record is something that his family can be proud of, and be proud of over the generations.

One can only hope that while Maris was alive--he died at just 51 years of age in 1985--he could be proud of his accomplishment, too.