Pre-steroid-Bonds**
Post-steroid-Bonds***
Can you define what you mean by purist? Does this mean that you don’t recognize games that are played on astro turf (which changes the way a ball bounces) or games that use the DH (so a manager does not have to make the decision to pinch hit for a pitcher in a tight situation when the pitcher is still getting outs) or the way some ballparks may have a huge amount of foul territory so more batters foul out instead of getting another pitch to hit, or the difference in outfields (it used to be 296 feet in Yankee Stadium when Ruth played), or the fact that baseball was segregated until the 1950’s , so all the great players were actually NOT competing against all the great non-white great players (same with the Negro Leagues, their records are meaningless also) or that Roger Maris had 8 more games to hit his “record” 61st home run when MLB went from 154 to 162 games or playoff and World series games played in 30-40 degree weather very late on the east coast?
I love the game, but pure it is not.
I was just thinking…I was at the June 22 game between the Phillies and the Indians, where a career home run record was tied, and special balls were not used.
(Bonus points to the first Doper who identifies the record.)
Heh - that’s pretty funny. Russell Branyan - you’re famous now!
Jamie Moyer became the pitcher with the most HRs hit against him in the history of the game. I bet he cherishes that game ball…
Bonus points to Munch.
The one funny thing was that when Branyan hit that home run, there was absolutely no mention of the record, from anywhere in the park. I didn’t even realize the record had occurred until I got home. The other funny thing was that that was probably the longest home run I’ve ever seen in person. Nobody on the Phillies even bothered to turn around to watch it go.