Clearing the Bases: Juiced Players, Monster Salaries, Sham Records, and a Hall of Famer's Search for the Soul of Baseball

208 Pages·2006·1.08 MB·english

by  Mike Schmidt

C L E A R I N G
t h e B A S E S
Juiced Players, Monster Salaries,
Sham Records, and a Hall of Famer’s
Search for the Soul of Baseball
MIKE SCHMIDT
WITH
GLEN WAGGONER
My parents, Lois and Jack Schmidt of Dayton, Ohio, gave me every
possible opportunity to cultivate and expand my life. Love, dis-
cipline, education, faith—they provided everything a young man
could need from a family, including a wonderful sister, Sally.
My wife, Donna, has been my mentor, best friend, and one
true love for thirty-two years—as well as mother to Jessica Rae and
Jonathan, two bright and shining stars who continue to light up
my life.
To all of them, I dedicate this book in appreciation of the un-
conditional love they have showered on me.
CONTENTS
PHOTOGRAPHIC INSERT
INTRODUCTION Take Me Out to a Ball Game 1
1 A Simple Game 7
2 United, We Stood 21
3 The Best of Times 39
4 Turn Out the Lights 55
5 All Good Things 63
6 The Worst of Times 71
7 Looking for an Edge 81
8 Finding the Abyss 87
9 Better Than Ever 103
10 The Boom-Boom Years 121
iv CONTENTS
11 Deck the Hall 139
12 What About Pete? 151
13 Summer School 165
14 Still the Best Game in Town 185
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 197
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CREDITS
COVER
COPYRIGHT
ABOUT THE PUBLISHER
INTRODUCTION
Take Me Out to a Ballgame
The strike of 1994, culminating in the cancellation of the 1994
World Series, seemed like the last straw for baseball fans. The
decade-long bickering and sniping between owners and players had
come to a head. To many, it seemed like a fight between the Rich
and the Also Rich, Greed vs. More Greed. The fans, the people
who shelled out a couple hundred bucks to take the kids out to the
ballpark for a game, were the biggest losers.
Fans had simply had enough of what they saw as overpaid play-
ers wanting more money from whining owners. Although baseball
came back in 1995, thanks to a judge in the Bronx who ruled that
the owners were engaging in unfair labor practices, a lot of fans
didn’t. By 1996, attendance was down by 15 percent across base-
ball. The game appeared to have lost its historic hold on many
Americans’ lives.
I know it had on mine.
Except for my induction into the Hall of Fame in late summer
2 INTRODUCTION
of 1995, I had lost interest in baseball, and it in me. I was living
in Florida, and my attention was primarily focused on family and
golf. (I had aspirations of turning pro and playing on the Senior
Tour when I turned fifty. I came close. But that’s another story for
another time.)
I only occasionally watched baseball on TV. From 1992 through
2000, the only game I attended—at least one that didn’t involve a
special public appearance—was Opening Day for the Marlins orga-
nization in 1993.
Then it happened: the 1998 season, Mark McGwire vs. Sammy
Sosa, the home run race that captivated baseball fans everywhere.
I was hooked. In September, I followed every at-bat of both guys.
I remember once being at an airport, watching their first at-bats on a
TV in a bar, among a crowd that was ten deep. I waited until the last
minute to board the fl ight, and then I asked the pilot if he could up-
date us, not on the games, just on Mac and Sammy. The pilot would
come on and say, “After two at-bats, neither Sammy nor Mark has
homered.” As soon as the plane landed, I ran to the nearest TV.
It was awesome. I knew these guys could hit—everybody knew
that—but who knew they were such great showmen? I was watching
at home on September 8, the night McGwire hit number 62. It was
magical. I had goose bumps. Then, when he went into the stands and
hugged Roger Maris’s family, I cried along with the rest of America.
Can you believe it happened against the Cubs, with Sammy
watching? When they showed Sammy clapping in right field, and
then hugging Mark near the dugout, I fell in love with baseball all
over again.
Only in baseball, a sport whose history is well known and cher-
ished, a sport that moves slowly enough for all fans to appreciate
the moment, a sport whose fans are so connected to the game’s
past, could a scenario like this pack such an emotional wallop.
So the Mac & Sammy Show brought me back to baseball, just
Introduction 3
as it did millions of fans across the country. It was an escape from
the daily bickering between owners and players, and an escape from
the public focus on greedy, overpaid players. It offered fans across the
country a headline, a prime topic for water cooler and lunch table
conversation.
The 1998 season offered us all a reason to come back to base-
ball. Little did any of us realize at the time that our game’s renais-
sance had an ugly side.
“If I had played in the 1990s, I would have used steroids. Why?
Because I’m human.”
I said those words on the HBO show Costas Now in July 2005.
I said them in response to a direct question from Giants running
back Tiki Barber. I said them in the heat of a panel discussion—Bob
Costas and NBC’s Jimmy Roberts were the other participants—on
the state of sports in America today.
Much as I wish I’d thought more carefully before I spoke—it
was uncharacteristic of me not to, I assure you—what I said wasn’t
far from the truth. Hey, when I played I was the typical power hitter
looking for an edge to keep up with my competition. Why, in a dif-
ferent time and a different situation, wouldn’t I have fallen victim
to the use of steroids? Certainly I would have been tempted.
But only tempted, I am now certain. In my research for this
book, I have thought long and hard about the use of performance-
enhancing drugs in baseball. (You’d expect that, of course, given
the thousands of headlines and millions of words devoted to the
subject in the past few years.) I have come to understand how ste-
roid use has spread to the high school and college level. I have
reflected on the destructive impact steroids have had on baseball’s
precious history, its records, and the very integrity of the sport.
And I believe in my heart that I would have chosen not to use
steroids.
4 INTRODUCTION
But I also believe I understand what drove those who did.
The Steroid Era in baseball—roughly, 1990–2005—was fueled
by a motive as old as the game itself: the search for a competitive
edge.
But other factors have played major, if less threatening, roles in
transforming baseball in the last three decades.
Free agency, more than anything else, created today’s game. By
righting a major wrong in the way baseball went about its business,
the great Marvin Miller and the early pioneers (Curt Flood, Andy
Messersmith, Dave McNally) brought baseball into synch with the
American concept of a free market system.
But there’s no such thing as a free lunch, and a downside to
free agency is that loyalty to team is a forgotten concept in baseball
today. Pedro Martinez is a Red Sox star who helps break the Curse
of the Bambino, he almost becomes a Yankee, and suddenly he’s a
Met—all in the space of, what, three months? Admit it, that little
dance made your head spin. And now, Johnny Damon’s a Yankee?
Is it good for the game that the free agent declaration and sign-
ing periods are nearly as big news as the playoffs and the World
Series? I don’t think so.
And what about baseball’s fundamental economic structure,
one that has greatly widened the gap between rich and poor in re-
cent decades? Is it good for baseball that one team has a payroll of
more than $200 million, and can buy a Gary Sheffield one year and
a Randy Johnson the next, while sixteen of their competitors have
payrolls under $60 million? I don’t think so.
Baseball’s soul resides in its history. Can you imagine playing
this coming season with the past being a void? I mean, if all that
happened before Opening Day 2006 were to be washed from our
memories, what would the new season be like?
Football and basketball, I submit, wouldn’t be hurt all that
much by the loss of their history. They are sports of Right Now. For