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HOME RUN CHASESeptember 6, 1998Allan H. "Bud" SeligST. LOUIS, MISSOURI COMMISIONER SELIG: Just a couple of words to tell you how happy I am to be here today and all. This has been another one of those almost hard to articulate enthralling moments in baseball history. As some of you have written this week, there is something in the pursuit of records that only baseball delivers in terms of emotion, in terms of its captivating the public and I am proud the way that everybody has handled themselves, in particular Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa and everybody else involved. It has been quite a summer in every way and certainly they played a major role in that. Q. Where were you in 1961? COMMISIONER SELIG: I was in Milwaukee. I remember it well. Following Roger Maris's pursuit that summer, talking in those days to a lot of Braves players who knew Roger Maris well, so I find this �� what I find so interesting is the difference in terms of the public and the media to McGwire and to Sammy Sosa as opposed to Roger Maris. I sort of consider �� not sort of, I consider myself a baseball historian, while I think it was unfair to Roger Maris as my father often told me nobody ever told you that life would be fair. Q. Why do you suppose there is such a difference today as to when Roger was doing it? COMMISIONER SELIG: Well, one can only speculate almost Roger Maris. It wasn't Joe DiMaggio or Mickey Mantle. It was New York. It was, you know, we grow comfortable with records and while we all say very easily that records are made to be broken, there are some records when they are broken that bother people. This isn't the case this time. This is one of those situations in life where people are happy. Something we in baseball must always remember. This has made millions and millions of people genuinely happy and there are a lot of reasons for it, but not the least of which is the way that the people involved have conducted themselves. Q. As you followed it in 1961 being a Yankee fan what were your personal feelings? COMMISIONER SELIG: Well, I was �� I was, I guess in a certain sense, �� I was a great Yankee fan but I was a Joe DiMaggio fan. I was happy. There is something about baseball records if they are broken in a �� I mean, if there is no taint to them, there is no taint to them, you are happy. So I guess when I look back, I am sort of stunned that there were only 23,000 people in Yankee Stadium the day Roger hit the home run off of Tracey Staller (phonetic). That surprised me. Q. (Inaudible.) COMMISIONER SELIG: I thought Mark McGwire said something very interesting yesterday. It is not my fault that they went to 162 games. He is right, you know, if you want the difference in history start comparing different eras, I can make all kinds of cases, yes, they may say there has been dilutions because of pitching, but I submit to you that the travel is much more difficult in a great sense and there are a lot of other variables that make it tougher today. So no, I don't believe in asterisks. I believe that is wrong. Q. Do you think there are enough people around who remember how life was for Maris and for Aaron that are controlling those feelings in trying to make them better? COMMISIONER SELIG: Well, I am sensitive having Hank played for us before and he and I have been friends now for a little over 40 years and you talk about unfairness. I would say to you and I have seen the hate mail. I have read a lot of the mail. I am close enough to Hank that I know to this day Hank is still deeply hurt and should be. And I think you talk about unfair, I think that what Hank Aaron had to endure in 1973 and in 1974 and actually for years after, was so unfair and wrong that I would hope that nothing like that ever happens again. I mean, it was �� and I know, knowing Hank as well as I guess you know that I know him and as close as we are, I mean, I didn't understand it then. I just couldn't conceive that a man breaking a record and over a magnificent career that Hank had, that people could possibly be offended. But even if they were offended they write the letters they did and to endure what he had to endure was �� well, it was disgraceful at best. And I would hope that �� I mean this is just wonderful and I just �� there are times in life to celebrate. This is a time in life to celebrate. Q. Building your new park, how much thought went into the dimensions and making it hitter�friendly or pitcher�friendly and why do you think so many of the new parks built are smaller? COMMISIONER SELIG: You try to build fan�friendly parks. I will submit to you I can honestly say that I had nothing to do with designing the dimensions in Milwaukee. Actually my daughter, Sal Bando and Robin Yount did that. Let me take you back to something. You are trying �� in new ballparks, old ballparks, you are trying to build new ballparks that have their own indigenous characteristics � indigenous characteristics, for instance, Ebbetts Field for those �� Crousley Field, Connie Mack Stadium, with their type of dimension, even the Polo Grounds, as strange as those dimensions are, and I tell you that there is more discussion, my own feeling that new ballparks ought to be built with not only to be fan�friendly, but with dimensions that make it really distinctive and sometimes you know the creation of shorter porches, as they used to call them when I was a kid, I think is good. So that is part of it. Q. Because there are two guys who will probably break Roger Maris' record and because there will be so many 50 or more home�run hitters, do you think this will cheapen the record in anyway? COMMISIONER SELIG: I don't think so. I really don't. I have talked to a lot of people, especially over the last two, three months, especially players, former executives, other people, no, I don't agree at all. I think that what you are seeing is really remarkable in a certain sense. The accomplishments of McGwire who, after all, when he hasn't been hurt in the last decade, has done very, very well. I mean, this is not �� this is not somebody that just came up and did this and you can say what an aberration. Granted, Sammy Sosa is having an extraordinary year. No, I really don't believe it. And if I look at the home runs per game even with expansion � let me be candid with you about that, they are just up just a very infinitesimal amount, it is like 200ths of a home run which is tough to do. Q. What is it about baseball that makes the statistics so memorable? COMMISIONER SELIG: I think because of history. I really believe that. I can remember so much �� I can only talk to you from my own perspective � there is so much in history that you remember and as a big a fan, as I am of the other sports, and those of you who know me well know that is true�I couldn't sit here and articulate records, yet I can still �� Kenny Keltner (phonetic) used to live in Milwaukee. I loved him. He was one of the nicest men I ever knew, but I was mad at him because he stopped Joe D.'s hitting streak and Joe started one after that. Every time I see Kenny: Boy, you are a great guy, but how can you have done that. You made those plays and you didn't even know what you were doing. There is something about that record. When you see somebody hit 3000 hits �� I know the night that Robin Yount did it and a generation of people growing up, but there was more love and emotion in a ballpark that night that I had ever seen. I remember the night Spawn (Phonetic) won his 300th game. There was aura about it. You can go on and on and on. It is hard to articulate except for people who follow a game, then they hit certain barriers �� it is incredible. And they never forget those. They never �� it is interesting they never forget what �� where they were and you can't say that in any other sport or really almost about any other thing. Q. Where does baseball stand in finding out the effects of players on steroids? COMMISIONER SELIG: Well, we have �� the Players Association and ourselves in a joint effort are pooling a lot of medical information. I have talked to a significant number of doctors who are expert in the field and quite frankly, it reminds me of a lot of things in life. You can hear about what you want to hear. My question in the last two weeks to many doctors would be: Do I have anything to worry about. And I have gotten a whole range of answers. But we are going to do this very thoroughly and very sensitively because as I said at that time, I think we, above all, have an obligation to everybody in baseball, to give them the best medical information that we can give. Until we have that, it is not appropriate for me to comment. Q. How much credit do you give this home�run race to a regenerated interest in baseball? COMMISIONER SELIG: Well, I was reminded here by Pedro Gomez that I had said a year ago that we were in the early stages of a very powerful recovery. I said to you all last spring that I thought we were in the middle stages, clearly for once in my life, something that I normally don't do � I had understated things. I give a significant series of things and people credit for what has happened, but certainly the home run chase has been �� I mean, it has just been unbelievable. I give �� it has just been �� it is huge. It is huge. Q. What do you think will be remembered more in history, the person who first breaks Roger Maris' record or the one who sets the new record? COMMISIONER SELIG: I'd like to think of myself as a historian again, but that is a question I can't answer. That is a good question and I am not sure that I have �� I think the person that probably breaks the record first, but this �� the whole month of September could be a tremendous duel between the two and who winds up on top will also be. That is �� that is one that I think may be the retrospect of history will have to determine. I am not sure I can answer that correctly today. Q. Have you found anybody who has been negative about what this is doing �� that it is just one aspect of baseball? COMMISIONER SELIG: Given the mood of the country and given what generally goes on, the amazing thing to me is there has been almost no negative. Usually, you know, obviously all of you have debated how much they �� dilution of pitching, fan�friendly smaller ballparks, series of things all of which are legitimate things, but other than that, I think what has been amazing and we have done a lot of polling all over the last two or three weeks too. And I would tell you that positive response to this in focus groups, in polling in everything else, has been remarkable. Q. Maybe the last record in baseball that approaches this magnitude with Pete Rose is where you were; do you have any feelings of melancholy? COMMISIONER SELIG: I saw it on television. It was an absolutely remarkable record both in terms of skill and endurance. But I do not have any second thoughts about the other matter. Q. Do you expect to make a decision on Marge Schott's (phonetic) future in the near future? COMMISIONER SELIG: The answer is I'd rather concentrate on what I came here to concentrate on. End of FastScripts |
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