Believe it or not I'm not referring to A-Rod (or A-Roid as Jason Tanamor refers to him) or the claims made by Roberto Alomar's ex-girlfriend that he has "full blown AIDS" and has carelessly given it to her (who does not have HIV ironically enough). She's suing him I believe for "AIDS phobia." My guess is that nothing is going to come of this lawsuit, but who knows/cares.
What I really want to do is take this time to celebrate the only All-Star to come out of the steroid era unscathed (so far). The superstar that I'm referring to is Ken Griffey Jr. I grew up a Cubs fan watching Ryne Sandberg, Mark Grace, Andre Dawson and Greg Maddox. One day the Cubs got rid of Greg Maddox and shortly thereafter Dawson was gone and Sandberg retired. At the same time this sweet swinging left handed center fielder was coming up in Seattle. Almost instantly this guy was a true stud. Everything he did appeared so effortless, yet he was always giving 100%.
Ken Griffey Jr. definitely walked with a swagger, especially after he pulled the ball out of the ballpark. He never had a ridiculous homerun total, but he consistently put up solid numbers, much like Hand Aaron did. After a couple of freak injuries, Griffey started to become injury prone. It seemed like most of his injuries came while he was going all out for a pop fly in center field. As he got older his numbers started to decline and he has had a hard time completing a complete season without being on the disabled list for at least part of it. This should be the natural progression for most athletes. Yet Roger Clemens, Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire seemed to almost be getting better as they aged.
What makes Griffey even more special is that in his prime he was probably one of the top 5 to 10 players of all time. He could do anything as well as anybody. Griffey was supposed to be the guy to break Aaron's record, but injuries prevented that. Had they not prevented that, Bonds would still be chasing the record. The saddest part about A-Roid coming out is that he was suppose to be the guy to bring integrity back to the homerun record when he eventually broke it.
I hope that going forward we start to see how special Ken Griffey Jr. truly is/was. I realize that by writing this or even thinking this, I open myself up to disappointment, because I don't know for a fact that Ken Griffey Jr. is completely clean, but his statistical trend is that he didn't, so I'm fairly confident that Griffey is clean and the true best player of that era. Jr. has played 20 seasons with 2,680 hits, 503 doubles and 611 homeruns. His career batting average is .288. He consistently hit above .300 from 1990 to 1997. In 1996 he hit 49 homeruns, 56 in '97 and '98 48 in '99 and 40 in '00. He average 39 homeruns for every 162 games he's played, which would be damn near 800 if he had stayed healthy. He debuted in 1989 at the age of 18.
To Ken Griffey Jr, my hat is off to you. I really hope to God that what I'm saying is true. You're a true hero in the game of baseball. You've always been a class act (when Griffey hit his 500th homerun, the fan that caught it gave it to him. Griffey repaid him by providing him with an all expenses paid trip to the All-Star game). It really is a shame that more people can't celebrate players like Griffey for the fear that one day it may turn out that they were on steroids.
BYLINE:
Bob Zerull is a frequent movie and concert goer who talks about his ventures to arenas and theaters more than any person should be allowed to do. Now, he puts them down on paper. Email him your thoughts at: bzerull19@gmail.com.
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