A Briton shouldn’t really love baseball. In fact, why in the hell would you love a game that’s a little to close to a girl’s game we call Rounders?
Truth be told, if I hadn’t fallen in love with New York City during a trip to the place in the 80s, I probably wouldn’t have liked baseball. And if I hadn’t spend endless summer vacations inside watching WGN TV and the crazy Harry Caray, I probably wouldn’t have fallen in love with the game. Due to my love of New York City though, I fell for the Yankees mainly because of the Twin Towers, not George Steinbrunner.
Then came the Summer of ’98. The people of London during the Second World War had less bombs falling on them than baseball fans did during that seemingly endless longball summer.
Although rainclouds stopped my chance to see McGwire, I still got to see David Wells pitch his perfect game. But really, I would have loved to have been a part of the MLB’s longest-running home run derby. My man was McGwire. I loved him because not only was he a great sport, but for the fact that he also doted on his son, Matt. I loved him because he blanked the autograph scalpers- settling instead for pens in kids’ hands. I loved him because he did a bunch of charity work and never asked for the world’s love in turn. But most of all, I loved him because he could quite simply crush the thing.
But, like McGwire, I loved Sammy Sosa too. Harry Caray loved Sammy as much as we all did, and I loved the thing he did with his fingers. And I knew he’d always been able to hit the ball out of the park, so 61 didn’t seem totally out of reach..
I nearly cried with McGwire hit the record-breaking shot. Like Joe Buck, I stood up and applauded.
I refused to acknowledge the Andro scandal in 1998, telling myself that they could say whatever, but McGwire was innocent in my book. I hated Reilly for embarrassing Sammy Sosa with that whole “pee in a cup and get it tested thing” he did to him. “Harry would turn over in his grave,” I remember thinking.
Six years and change later I saw my heroes go before congress to explain away the summer of ’98.
All Congress asked for was the truth about steroids. Did they do them? If so, how much? Suddenly, I was rooting for both of them, crossing my fingers, hoping Mac and Sammy would simply deny all charges, and that would be that. “They are great guys,” I told my friends, “They’d never cheat.”
When his turn’s up in the suited batter’s box,Mac pleads the fifth. Sammy suddenly gets an attack of incompetent English speaker syndrome. Would you do that if you were innocent of all charges? I mean, would you?
After that I felt like a cheated wife. All my emotional and financial investment into something I loved had been given a right royal slap in the face. And until Selig and co can throw the cheats out of baseball and Mac and Sammy give some answers, I’m still feeling a little bruised.