All language subtitles for Baseball A Film By Ken Burns S01E10 (Baseball A Film By Ken Burns S01E10) (ENGLISH)

More than anything else, what adheres me
to baseball, and always has, is this sense

that I am essentially watching the
same game that somebody saw in 1860.

The history of it, it is the only sport
that goes forwards and backwards.

Other sports have
some interest in their own

history and will occasionally
make reference to it.

But baseball, it's there.

You come in at the start of the game,
or the start of the season, or the start

of your own fandom, you feel as if
you are joining the river midstream.

And all that has gone before, you
can enjoy as much as if you were there.

It's as simple as that.

As the tumultuous twentieth century drew
to a close, and a new millennium began,

the game of baseball, now more than 150
years old, remained remarkably unchanged.

Three strikes still made an out.

Six outs an inning.

The distance from home plate to
first base was still a perfect ninety feet.

Ball players, managers, and even
fans continued to cling to their cherished

superstitions, hoping
against hope to intervene in

outcomes actually determined
by talent and preparation.

Accidents.

And error.

Superstars continued to retire as
heroes in the full glare of the spotlight,

while lesser players
continued to quietly disappear.

Their statistics, the only residue
of their existence in the game.

But baseball was changing.

New franchises would
spring up in new cities.

Interleague play would be instituted
during the regular season, as the lines

between the American and
National leagues began to blur.

One team would even change leagues,
something that had never happened before.

And baseball would
expand the playoffs,

allowing wildcard teams
into the postseason.

It would now be possible for a second-place
team to win the World Championship.

Salary levels, attendance, and home
run totals would all be shattered while new

stadiums and new television
networks brought in new fans.

A trio of remarkable pitchers would
lead the Atlanta Braves to 14 consecutive

division titles, while a hard luck old
school manager would guide the New York

Yankees, who had made
the playoffs only once since

1981, to the World Series
six times in eight years.

Baseball had never seemed so healthy,
but in a time of unimaginable wealth and

unbridled speculation throughout the
country, the age-old battle between the

owners and the players would
bring the national pastime to its knees.

The game would have to
go through its own dark ages

before it would emerge
stronger than ever before.

And behind the scenes, in secret,
players on every team found themselves

making life-altering decisions about
how far they were willing to go to succeed.

Meanwhile, an unstoppable assembly of
free spirits playing for one of the sport's

oldest teams would do
the impossible, erasing

decades of despair
for their followers.

Through it all, baseball, still the
best game that's ever been invented,

brought some of the most
vivid memories and provided

some of the most dramatic
moments anyone had ever seen.

The idea that you can walk into a
ballpark, whether it's Fenway Park,

Yankee Stadium, or
wherever, and sit down and

watch a game played by
boys who have become men.

So you can imagine yourself still playing
this game, no matter what age you are.

And when you sit there, the door to your
past life, which occurred 15 minutes ago,

at the office, on the bus, in your home,
that door closes and you get lost in the

technical details, the intricate
details of baseball as it's played out.

There's always a
surprise in baseball.

God, I never thought he'd
be able to get to that ball.

That's part of baseball's magic.

Unbelievable!

On October 14th, 1992, the Pittsburgh
Pirates were in Atlanta, facing the Braves

in the seventh and deciding game of
the National League Championship Series.

With two outs in the bottom
of the ninth, Pittsburgh

led 2-1, but Atlanta
had the bases loaded.

A pinch hitter, Francisco Cabrera,
who had had only 10 at-bats all season,

was at the plate.

And now the Braves'
season hangs in the balance.

He hacked at the
2-0, now the 2-1.

With the tying run in, most assumed
that the runner on second, Sid Bream,

hobbled by five knee
operations would be held at third.

But the third base coach,
sent Bream anyway.

For the next decade and a half,
Atlanta would dominate the National

League, returning again
and again to the post-season.

The once-promising Pirates
would go in the opposite

direction, often finishing at
the bottom of the standings.

And their supremely talented A talented
left fielder, who had almost thrown Brehm

out, would never again
play for Pittsburgh.

During the off-season,
he would sign the most

expensive free agent
contract the game had yet seen.

He would go on to become
one of the greatest and most

controversial players
in the history of baseball.

He's a very
complicated character.

He is brilliant.

He is blessed.

And yet he gave the impression that his
life was a burden, that the gifts that he

had somehow just wore
him down, and that he

couldn't stand for
people to be in his space.

I've come to believe that we should
never get to know anybody too well.

And I think that we got
to know him too well.

Back in the spring of 1986, a slender
young outfielder named Barry Lamar Barnes

had been called up by
the Pittsburgh Pirates.

His promise as a baseball
player was undeniable.

He was the son of Bobby Barnes,
who had signed his first professional

contract 11 days after Barry
was born in July of 1964.

Bobby was sent to North Carolina to play
in the minors, 2500 miles away from his

wife and infant son back
in Riverside, California.

In the South, Bobby came face to
face with the vestiges of Jim Crow.

Fans called him
unspeakable names.

Darkie, Coon, Nigger.

He was lonely and humiliated.

But on the field, Bobby Barnes hit
lots of home runs and stole lots of bases.

And before long, he was promoted
to the San Francisco Giants.

He played in the outfield
alongside the great

Willie Mays, to whom
Bobby was often compared.

Mays took Bobby under his wing and
agreed to be young Barry's godfather.

When he was just two years
old, Barry hit a wiffle ball so hard,

he shattered a living
room window and at five

began accompanying his
father to Candlestick Park.

He followed his godfather everywhere,
seeing that Mays, after years of

celebrity, seemed tired of
the demands of stardom.

Barry heard Mays' advice,
and he said, and advised his

father not to trust anyone, to
look out only for number one.

As Barry began to develop his own
skills on Bay Area Little League diamonds,

his father became a star, twice stealing
30 bases and hitting 30 home runs,

and winning three
Gold Glove Awards.

But after games, he often
downed a few beers in the

clubhouse, and then moved
to a nearby bar for more.

His drinking, and the controversies that
sometimes accompanied it, frustrated the

Giants' organization, and after the 1974
season, they traded him to the Yankees.

Bobby Bonds would hit 30 home runs
and steal 30 bases three more times,

but he was unable to outrun his own
demons, and was traded from club to club,

seven in seven years.

Embittered, and increasingly estranged
from his family, he came to resent the

fans, the press, and
those who ran the game.

No one in baseball ever
supported Bobby Bonds.

The owner, the general
manager, the press, the

teammates, nobody in the
game stood up for the father.

So what Barry learned about baseball was,
great talent matters, great scholarship

about the game matters, but you can't
count on anybody in this game to stand up

for you, because they
didn't stand up for my father.

By the time he finished
high school, Barry Bonds had

become one of the best
young players in the country.

In 1982, the Giants offered to sign him
for $70,000, but when Bonds asked for just

$5,000 more, they decided to pass, and he
went to Arizona State University instead.

Three years later, Bonds signed with
the Pittsburgh Pirates, and after only 115

minor league games,
was called up to the majors.

He was only 21 years old, but
expectations could not have been greater.

On the base paths and in the outfield,
Bonds was exceptionally fast, and quickly

established himself as one of the
greatest defensive players in the game.

One day, a teammate said, he will
put up numbers no one can believe.

Bonds had speed.

He had power.

He had defensive ability.

He had base-running
intelligence.

He knew the game
backwards and forwards.

He had a great
flair for the dramatic.

You could just see 20 years of a
career unfolding, and the prospect, again,

of the greatest player of all time, which
we all want to see from the beginning.

Breaking ball away from
him, and just didn't get it.

It's a game that he loves, a game that
he enjoys, a game that he has fun at.

He probably has more fun at baseball than
any baseball player in the major leagues.

He has fun playing the game.

If he handles himself the way he is
capable of, he's going to be a consistent

star for years, said his
manager, Jim Leland.

But off the field, he
could be self-absorbed,

defensive, and prone
to volatile outbursts.

You never knew what you were
getting at Barry Bonds' locker.

You know, one day he
could be very charming

and tell you the greatest
stories of the world.

One day, he just might
bite your head off and

tell you to get lost in
very unpolite terms.

Well, I'm his father.

You've got to realize this.

And we've walked in the clubhouse,
and he stopped talking to me.

He, like, goes into this place,
and he didn't want to be bothered.

He did little to
cultivate the press.

My job does not say, walk in the
locker room and kiss butt, he told them.

It says, go to work.

When reporters mistakenly
called him Bobby, he snapped.

I'm Barry.

Bobby's my father.

And he was quick to remind them how
badly he thought they had treated his dad.

He asked them to judge him
only by his own accomplishments.

And when Pittsburgh writers and fans
heaped praise and affection on other less

talented players, like center fielder
Andy Van Slyke, Bonds seethed.

He didn't play the hero game.

And he did chafe at the fact that Andy
Van Slyke was a white player and was Mr.

Pittsburgh.

Barry used to call him
the Great White Hope.

And it just showed you how, how resentful
he was that he was the best player.

He was the guy with the talent.

He was the player
who was driving this, this

young Pittsburgh team
into a, into a powerhouse.

And yet he didn't get the type of
recognition that he thought he deserved.

In 1990, Bonds' fifth season in the
majors, he stole 52 bases, hit 33 home

runs, and helped lead Pittsburgh
to its first division title since 1979.

Baseball writers voted Bonds the
National League's most valuable player.

Pittsburgh would go on to win its
division again in 1991 and 1992.

But each time, they failed to reach the
World Series as Bonds struggled in the

postseason, hitting 191
with only one home run.

Still, in seven brilliant seasons, he
had become one of the premier players

in the game, twice stealing
30 bases and hitting 30

home runs in a single
season, just as his father had.

Winning three gold
gloves and another MVP.

It's in his mind, I want more.

I gotta get more,
I gotta get more.

He's just too proud.

He wants to be the best.

I mean, he's just not
going out there playing.

He wants to be the best.

Frustrated that the Pirates had never
paid him what he thought he was worth,

Bonds had no intention of spending
the rest of his career in Pittsburgh.

And now, at 28,
he was a free agent.

One thing was clear.

Wherever he chose to
play, he was sure to bring his

outsized talent and his
outsized baggage with him.

Wow.

One and two on Griffey.

Well in ball!

Back Griffey Jr.

In Seattle, another astonishingly
talented son of a major

leaguer, Ken Griffey Jr., was thrilling
fans with one of the most beautiful swings

in all of baseball history, and the joyous
abandon with which he played the game.

Unlike Barry Bonds, Griffey was loved as
well as admired, and in just five years in

the majors, had come to represent
the very best the game had to offer.

He played with great,
great enthusiasm.

He was glorious to watch,
really, really beautiful to watch.

We thought that he was going to
shine as the greatest player of his era.

On July 15, 1994, in a game between
the Chicago White Sox and the Cleveland

Indians, umpires
confiscated a bat belonging

to the Indian star
slugger Albert Bell.

They suspected Bell had
tampered with it, illegally hollowing

it out and filling it with cork
to enhance his bat speed.

Bell's teammates were worried.

They were sure that all
of Bell's bats were corked

and did not want their
best player suspended.

Indians pitcher Jason Grimsley had a
plan to get his teammate off the hook.

Gripping a flashlight with his teeth,
he hoisted himself into the crawl space

above the clubhouse and inched along
on his stomach until he was on top of the

umpire's dressing room where Bell's
bat had been locked away for safekeeping.

Grimsley lowered himself into the room,
replaced Bell's bat with an unadulterated

one belonging to another player,
and then crawled back to the clubhouse.

The umpires were furious
when they discovered the

switch, but there was
little they could do about it.

The hero of the piece is
probably Jason Grimsley

because he's the one
acting on behalf of the team.

This is a man willing to commit a kind
of low-scale burglary, a minor Watergate

operation, in fact, a break-in to
go and get this evidence back.

I mean, there's something
to be celebrated in that.

I'm not exactly sure what, but
there's your problem with cheating.

Some of it is, in fact, weirdly
commendable, if not noble.

You know, Gaylord Perry, how many times
did he throw a spitball and how many times

did he merely convince
you that he threw a spitball?

How many of these are not so much
cheats as deceptions, artful deceptions?

Ever since Jim Creighton, a pitcher
for the Brooklyn Niagara's, first illegally

snapped his wrist in 1859 to throw a
rising fastball designed to fool hitters,

players have found ways to
bend or get around the rules.

For the most part, the game's many
transgressors have been celebrated for

their creativity, as much as they
have been castigated for their misdeeds.

When New York Giants third baseman Bobby
Thompson hit one of the most famous home

runs in the history of the game, he
and his teammates were using an illegal

sign-stealing system that told
the hitters what pitch was coming.

Yankee left-hander Whitey Ford sometimes
cut the ball with his wedding ring and

smeared it with a
mixture of turpentine,

resin and baby oil his
teammates called gunk.

He was easily elected
to the Hall of Fame,

considered one of the
greatest pitchers of all time.

Late in his career, Hall of Fame pitcher
Gaylord Perry confessed what those who had

played against him knew all too well,
that he had regularly doctored the ball.

Generations of major leaguers,
including some of the greatest stars in

the game, used some form of amphetamines
to increase their focus and energy.

In the late 1980s, some baseball players
had found a new way to gain an edge.

In 1988, Jose Canseco astounded the
baseball world when he became the first

player to hit 40 home runs and
steal 40 bases in a single season.

He told the press that intensive weight
training was the reason for his success.

But something else was
helping him achieve such

an unprecedented
combination of speed and power.

There was another player
now in the Hall of Fame

who literally stood with
me and mixed something.

And I said, what's that?

And he said, it's a Jose
Canseco milkshake.

And that year, that Hall of Famer hit more
home runs than he ever hit any other year.

So it wasn't just Canseco.

And so one of the
reasons that I thought that it

was an important subject
was it was spreading.

It was already
spreading by 1988.

The sports writer Tom Boswell tried to
raise the issue, but no one paid attention.

Soon, other players, including some of
Canseco's Oakland teammates, were asking

him for advice following
his training program.

We began seeing these enormous
bodies like we'd never seen before.

And, you know, when you saw
some guys take off their shirts,

all of a sudden it's like,
whoa, what's going on here?

Canseco and others had transformed their
bodies by taking heavy doses of anabolic

steroids, synthetically
produced testosterone.

When taken in large enough amounts,
it allowed users to lift prodigious

amounts of weight every
single day, rapidly building

muscle mass while increasing
their speed and agility.

They found out, if you take
this, you'll get stronger quicker.

The ball will go 15 feet
further than it never did.

Your swing through the zone
across home plate, which is

that big, will be that much
quicker, thus more power.

They're human.

They have a lot of time on
their hands during the day.

They watch SportsCenter.

They watch ESPN.

The highlight
films are all, wow!

Look at that one.

Grand Slam home
run hit the upper deck.

There's no highlight
films of bunts.

Synthetic testosterone had been created by
European scientists in the 1930s and used

experimentally by the Germans
during the Second World War

to enhance their soldiers'
strength and aggressiveness.

During the Cold War, Eastern Bloc
countries gave enormous doses to their

Olympic athletes and
won medal after medal.

In the 1960s, professional
football players started using them.

But in the mega doses athletes took,
steroids could cause tendon and ligament

tears, kidney and liver damage,
impotence, heart disease, and cancer.

By 1990, when Congress passed a law
making it a felony to traffic in steroids,

the Olympics, the NCAA, and
the NFL had already banned them.

In the wake of drug scandals that had
rocked the game in the 1980s, Commissioner

Fay Vincent was more concerned with
preventing cocaine and marijuana abuse.

And the powerful Major League Baseball
Players Association, now led by Donald

Feer, was vehemently opposed to any
mandatory steroid screening program as a

violation of their
members' right to privacy.

As a result, professional baseball players
were free to take whatever they wanted,

with no fear of punishment.

The notion that we would willingly
surrender to our employer as the price of

a job all the protections
we insist on from the

government is a rather
extraordinary notion.

The Players Association
did a horrible job in this case.

They should have seen this early on
and said, wait a minute, how can we expect

some of our players to compete at a
competitive disadvantage or force them to

make the horrible choice of
running whatever risks they're making,

whether it be to their health or their
reputations or whatever it may be,

to either use to keep up or don't
use and inevitably fall behind?

Who is it that we represent?

The guilty or the innocent?

It's my belief that if the means that
existed in the 90s existed in the 20s,

that Babe and all his friends
would have jumped in both feet.

And so would Mays and
Mantle and the people in the 50s.

If you're looking at that and saying to
yourself, I'm 35, I'm making $3 million a

year as a backup midfielder for the
San Diego Padres, not to pick on them.

And if I take this stuff, I can play
another five years and make another $15

million for my family and for
the fact of the rest of my life.

Why would you not do it?

You would have done anything
to get to the big leagues before.

You'll do anything to stay
in the big leagues now.

I think that's both very human and
also very true of anyone with the kind of

personality that gets to the
top of an athletic profession.

We live in a time when we think
everything can be cured by a medication.

If you want to talk about a
performance-enhancing culture,

let's look at Viagra.

Let's look at Levitra, all of these
things that are advertised on daytime TV.

This is the time we live in.

We believe that modern
medicine can make us supermen.

If our favorite ballplayers
have succumbed to societal

pressures to improve themselves,
they are no worse than we are.

People get upset.

Who in the whole country wouldn't take
a pill to make more money at their job?

You would.

Hey, there's a pill and you're going
to get paid like Steven Spielberg.

You would take the pill.

You just would.

It hasn't been easy
being a Giants fan.

I ask myself the question all
the time, why do I care so much?

Honestly.

It has to be a character flaw on
my part, a vice or just a weakness.

The Giants have been in San
Francisco, in my home region, for 50 years,

and we don't have a single
world championship to show for it.

They haven't won the World Series
since 1954 when they were in New York,

and I'm middle-aged now.

And I'm starting to wonder if it's
ever going to happen in my lifetime.

Ever since they had moved to San
Francisco's Candlestick Park, the Giants

had struggled to draw fans to the
coldest and windiest stadium in the majors.

In 1992, owner Bob Lurie demanded that the
city build him a new park, and when they

refused, decided to sell
the club to investors who

would move it back across
the continent to Florida.

Then, Peter McGowan, a former
supermarket magnate, bought the

team, and promised one day to
build the Giants a new ballpark.

He then began searching for a star,
a high-profile free agent, who could

attract the legions of fans he would
need to pay for his new stadium.

Good news for Giant fans.

Baseball's richest
contract handed out.

National League most valuable
player Barry Bonds agreed to a

six-year contract with the Giants
worth in excess of $43 million.

It was a Saturday night.

I was home.

I was watching television.

And there was a news flash that the
Giants were going to sign Barry Bonds.

Are you kidding me?

Because the Giants had a
chance to sign him coming out of

high school in the Bay Area,
and they wouldn't pay the price!

I mean, if someone had told us at the
time, we would have gladly passed a hat

and signed him for the money.

So when he came back, we
thought, okay, we've closed

that miserable chapter, and
now, maybe, we have a chance.

And I was aware
of his reputation.

But I didn't care.

I can't say how excited I am to have
the opportunity to go back home and have

something to share with my
family and the city that I grew up in.

My godfather, Willie Mays...

Um...

It's like a boyhood dream
that comes true for me.

He chose to wear his
father's old number, 25.

And a few days later, the Giants
announced that Bobby Bonds himself would be

rejoining his old team as
hitting and first-base coach.

Bobby had sworn off the drinking that
had derailed his career and complicated his

relationship with his
family and was happy to be

back in professional
baseball alongside his son.

Well, he hit a home run
in his first at-bat at Canal

State Park, and they won
the game in dramatic fashion.

And from day one, he was playing
on a level that I had never seen before.

First at-bat before
the new hometown fan.

And so, Barry Bonds put
that team on his shoulders,

and he hit 46 home runs
that year, and was just...

Every time they needed a
dramatic home run, he was there.

Bonds did exactly what Peter
McGowan was paying him to do.

He batted .336 and led the league
with 46 home runs and 123 RBIs.

All career highs.

He was named
MVP for the third time.

He was making baseball
fun again in San Francisco.

But for all of Bonds' greatness, the
Giants would make the playoffs only

once in the 1990s and
never reach the World Series.

As part of being a Giants fan, in lieu of
a championship, we had Barry Bonds.

All right?

And it was one of many bargains
that Giants fans have made

with themselves to get over
the fact that there's no title.

So from 1993 forward, Bonds
became the next best thing.

Baseball's economic model, individual
teams generating their own revenue and

keeping as much of it as they
could, predates television, radio, flight,

the internal combustion engine, it
goes back deep into the 19th century,

and it is utterly unsuited
to the modern age.

In 1994, the Montreal Expos looked
like the next great baseball dynasty.

They were loaded
with young talent.

Moises Alou, Larry Walker,
Marquis Grissom, Pedro Martinez.

And they posed a
serious threat to the Atlanta

Braves, the best team
in the National League.

By the end of July, the
Expos seemed unstoppable.

They were led by Moises
Alou's father, Felipe.

What a story.

The best team in baseball
resides in Montreal.

Well, that's the best team I
ever managed, at any level.

We had a club
that we didn't know.

We developed through
our minor league system.

We had tremendous pitching.

We had defense.

And I was young and eager and
a very hungry and healthy club.

Montreal was not the only city where great
baseball was being played that summer.

In San Francisco, Barry Bonds' teammate,
Matt Williams, was hitting home runs at a

furious pace, possibly on track to break
Roger Marris' single season record of 61.

In San Diego, Tony Gwynn, the Padres'
superb right fielder, had been hitting so

consistently that he had been able to
keep his batting average above 390.

By August, it seemed he might do what no
one had done since Ted Williams in 1941,

hit 400 for the season.

But then, developments off
the field stole the spotlight.

Ever since the players
had formed their union in

1966, tensions with the
owners had steadily escalated.

There had been a
strike or a lockout every

time they had had to
negotiate a new contract.

And over the years, court rulings had
given the players more and more power.

Now, in the middle of the 1994
season, the two adversaries

were embroiled in their
bitterest contract dispute yet.

It became carnivorous.

A terrible, terrible legacy grew up,
where it was expected that when the

collective bargaining agreement expired,
the two sides would be at daggers drawn,

and you would have
a work stoppage.

This bitterness and suspicion festered
because a number of owners, frankly,

were unreconciled to the
existence, not just this or

that behavior of the union,
the existence of the union.

Why did they want
to break the union?

Because then they could go back to
setting the salary levels, and over any

significant period of
time, the difference in their

revenue would be measured
in the billions of dollars.

Desperate to unify their own ranks, the
owners, who had also been squabbling

among themselves over revenue,
had ousted Commissioner Fay Vincent,

replacing him with one of their own,
Milwaukee Brewers owner Bud Selig.

Selig was certain that if baseball was to
thrive, the owners had to work in concert.

Unfortunately, the
acrimony between the parties

was so intense that we
just couldn't get anywhere.

By 93 and 94, you knew
that disparity had set in.

The small and medium market clubs were
really feeling that they had no chance.

The system needed significant economic
change, and we were getting nowhere,

and you couldn't go on
the way we were going.

During the 1994 season,
the owners made a

proposal they knew the
union would never accept.

They offered to share revenue with each
other, but only if the union agreed to a

limit on the total amount each team
could pay its players, a salary cap.

Don Fear and the Players Association
had been talking for 15 years about how a

salary cap was off the
table, that they could never

accept such a thing, and
they reacted accordingly.

You know, as far as we're
concerned, we're ready

to play, but we're
obviously not going to do it.

Under the terms of a salary cap, so
as soon as they're ready to come to us

with a deal, we feel like
they'll come to us and start

dealing, but we don't know
when that point in time is yet.

On August 12th, the
players walked out.

The baseball season
was suspended indefinitely.

The owners were prepared to wait them out,
confident that the union would give in.

The question here, ladies and
gentlemen, is one very simple one.

The players went out on strike.

Their average compensation
is $1.2 million, and all we

have been trying to find out is
how much more do they want.

This dispute arises because the clubs
could not get their own internal house in

order and redefine their
revenue-sharing rules.

You had two sides locked in a battle
that neither thought could be lost.

It's like, people who go
to court thinking, the jury

has got to see it my way
because I'm in the right.

But only a fool goes to court.

Only a fool stops playing
baseball in the middle of August.

Here is Bob Costas.

And the other shoe has finally
dropped in the ongoing baseball wars.

The acting commissioner,
Bud Selig, the owner of

the Milwaukee Brewers,
has just made it official.

The remainder of the regular
season and the entire postseason,

playoffs and World Series,
have officially been canceled.

This news release
was just issued.

When they agreed to cancel the World
Series, I remember thinking that this is

something you didn't think was going
to happen and that it really did prove how

much these two sides
really, really hated each

other and how little
they thought of the public.

Basically what?

They're arguing over how
to spend our money, right?

You know, I mean,
I'm a baseball fan.

I'd like to see them play ball, but, you
know, I have no sympathy for either party.

None.

The fact that it shut down and
stayed shut down was devastating.

I can remember being
in New York in the fall and

being on the 7 train and
going past Shea Stadium.

It looked like a... It looked
like a graveyard to me.

I can remember just thinking,
they should be playing right now.

And just being so angry to the point
where, like, there were tears in my eyes.

When the season ended after 117 games,
Tony Gwynn's batting average was .394.

I remember very well talking to Tony
Gwynn, who had really nothing to gain.

He was a superstar in 1994.

He didn't hesitate
about striking.

Because Tony Gwynn
said, I'm a Union guy.

People sacrificed for me.

I will sacrifice for the coming
generation of ballplayers.

Philippe Allou and the Montreal Expos were
in first place in their division with a

six-game lead over the
powerful Atlanta Braves.

They would never find out if they
were in fact the best team in baseball.

It was really sad to
not finish the season.

I believe that if we had finished
that season, we were gonna win it.

We were gonna get a stadium.

The interest of the fans
there was gonna be great.

That was the
beginning or the end.

The Expos would never
play that well again.

Their fans never came back.

12 years later, Montreal
would lose its baseball team.

This was the strike of the
millionaires versus the billionaires.

In people, it just had enough.

No one knew what revenue
sharing was or salary caps.

All they knew was that
there were two entities of

really rich people that
couldn't get it together.

I still think this
can be settled.

The parties are just gonna have to
decide whether they want to have a baseball

season in 95 and what the long-term damage
to baseball will be and therefore the

economics of both
sides if it doesn't happen.

During the off season, the owners declared
that negotiations had reached an impasse

and that they would therefore
implement a salary cap unilaterally.

And they outraged fans by
starting to hire replacements to

put on the field in place of
the striking major leaguers.

But in March of 1995,
federal judge Sonia Sotomayor

found the owners guilty
of negotiating in bad faith.

The players agreed to go
back to work under the contract

that had been in effect
before the strike began.

In the end, the owners
had lost more than $700

million without winning
a single concession.

But the players had forfeited something
more precious, the respect of millions of

fans who couldn't understand why
they had walked out in the first place,

since many of them
were earning more in one

week than the average
American made in a year.

They sometimes forget that
they're in the entertainment business.

They forget that without fans,
they're back on the farm playing ball

before cows, because
there's nothing intrinsically

valuable about the ability
to smack a ball with a bat.

It's a shame that sometimes those things
happen because the fans don't deserve it.

But baseball has an ugly
face, and it's the business part.

And negotiations are not pretty.

But fans can always remember
that we love to play for them.

And I don't think it's just
because of the money.

I think it's because
they love it.

They really love it.

Every big league
player loves the game.

When ballparks reopened in the spring
of 1995, many stadiums were half empty.

And those fans who did come
out seemed more interested

in berating their hometown
teams than cheering them on.

I have never encountered
such bitterness and

such assurances on
the parts of my friends.

That they would never watch another
baseball game, that they no longer cared

about the game, they were
going to shift their allegiance not

only from one team to another,
but from one sport to another.

I think the anger really
took baseball officials aback.

They really did not think that the anger
could sustain itself, and it really did.

And I think that you saw a
fan base saying to baseball,

you know what, it's not
your sport, it's our sport.

At Shea Stadium, fans
climbed onto the field and

tossed dollar bills at
the feet of Mets players.

In Detroit, they threw
bottles and cans, baseballs

and lighters, even a
hubcap onto the field.

All across the country, the game's biggest
stars were met with choruses of boos.

The loudest taunts were reserved for
players who had spoken for the union,

like Atlanta's ace
left-hander, Tom Glavin.

A month into the season,
attendance was down 20%.

Something had to be done.

The owners and the players knew they could
never risk alienating the public again.

You suffer a shocking loss and you think,
it's never going to be the same again.

And you're thinking, I'm
not going to another game.

I'm not going to pay
the prices that go into the

players' pockets and into
management's wallets.

I'm not going to do it.

I'm sick of all of them.

And then Ripken comes along.

The ball goes past Rick.

Ripken gets it to the ball.

Yes, he does.

Spires gets first.

Got it at first base.

Fires across.

He got it.

What a play by Cal.

Cal Ripken Jr. never wanted to do
anything but play in the major leagues.

The son of a Baltimore Orioles coach,
he often wore his Little League uniform to

bed so he could be ready
for the next day's game.

Since May of 1982, he had
started every Orioles game.

Cal Ripken's misunderstood.

He's not a great hitter
who was a good shortstop.

He's a great shortstop
who was a good hitter.

Magnificent at
charging the ball.

Excellent going in the hole.

Excellent behind second base because when
he picked up a ground ball, he could do

the 360 and throw to
first with real strength.

Oh, and one other thing.

He loved to turn the double play because
he loved to go up in the air and then come

down on the runners and see if
he could kill them after the play.

He was a tough, old school guy.

When play resumed after the strike,
Cal Ripken was only 116 games short of

breaking one of the most
formidable records in baseball.

If he stayed healthy, that
September, he would pass

Lou Gehrig's mark of 2,130
consecutive games played.

People said, gosh, isn't
he lucky he didn't get hurt.

Every baseball player
is hurt by August.

Knicks, bruises,
scrapes, strains, sprains.

He just played through it.

This was the face that baseball
needed to turn to a disenchanted fan base.

And it could not
have been better.

As he approached the record, Ripken
quietly waged a solitary campaign to

refill half-empty
ballparks, one fan at a time.

He truly acted like an adult after the
strike and saw what he could bring to the

game in 1995, even at an
enormous cost to himself.

Signing autographs for hours and hours, I
remember one night when we came back up

from interviewing and
finished our stories.

It's midnight now, and you look out
and there's still a line going all the way

back up into the stands and
Cal is still signing autographs.

On September 6th, 1995,
five months after the strike had

ended, the Orioles faced the
California Angels in Baltimore.

Tickets for this game had
been sold out for months.

After four and a half innings
of play, the game was official.

Cal Ripken had played in
2,131 consecutive games.

It would be three more years
before he finally took a day off.

By then, Cal Ripken had
played in 2,632 straight games.

Baseball had learned its lesson.

From now on, it would honor its players
and celebrate its most defining moments.

Watch Charlie and
see where he sets up.

No, staying away.

Got him, took something off.

Ten strikeouts for Maddox.

After the strike, the Atlanta Braves, led
by manager Bobby Cox, resumed their

remarkable supremacy
over the National League,

though a World Series
victory still eluded them.

Much of their success was
due to their phenomenal pitching

staff, anchored by Tom Glavin,
John Smoltz, and Greg Maddox.

I love, love to watch
Greg Maddox pitch.

They struck him out.

I love to watch this guy who looks like
a CPA, and I don't mean to knock CPAs.

Well, none of my best friends are
CPAs, but I don't mean to knock CPAs.

You see Maddox off
the field, he puts on his

glasses, he's this really
kind of nerdy looking guy.

He's not big, he's very normal size,
he does not throw particularly hard.

And he's arguably one of the three or
four best pitchers in baseball history.

There's this absolute
knowledge of knowing what he's

doing, and watching how
he does that, that was a thrill.

Through the 90s, when he was at his best,
he was the best pitcher I've ever seen.

Greg Maddox had learned
the game on the ball fields of

the many Air Force bases
where his father was stationed.

Maddox succeeded spectacularly by relying
on pinpoint control of five different

pitches and an uncanny ability
to detect each hitter's weakness.

In 1995, Maddox led the league in
wins, ERA, and innings pitched, winning his

fourth consecutive Cy Young Award,
something no pitcher had ever done before.

John Smoltz, a hard-throwing right-hander
from Lansing, Michigan, had helped pitch

his team to a pennant in
1992, leading the league in

strikeouts and winning three
games in the postseason.

Tom Glavin from Billerica, Massachusetts
had excelled as a pitcher and hockey

player in high school
and was drafted by both

the Braves and the Los
Angeles Kings of the NHL.

When the Braves had gone from last to
first in 1991, Glavin, who had perfected a

baffling change-up,
led the way, winning 20

games and the first of
his two Cy Young Awards.

In 1995, Atlanta's three
aces pitched the Braves to

their third World Series
appearance in five years.

They would face the Cleveland Indians,
playing in their first series since 1954.

Led by Albert Bell, Jim Tomey,
and a 23-year-old outfielder, Manny

Ramirez, Cleveland had
slugged its way to 100 wins.

The Indians were confident,
outspoken, and quick to remind

Atlanta that they had lost both
World Series they had played.

But thanks to their
superb pitching, Atlanta

won three out of
the first five games.

In game six, Bobby Cox sent Tom Glavin out
to try to secure the Braves' first World

Series title since 1957,
when they were in Milwaukee.

Atlanta fans, who had booed Glavin
unmercifully on opening day for being a

player representative,
now cheered him on as

he went to work on
Cleveland's powerful lineup.

Glavin pitched away from batters all
night, continually locating his fastballs

and change-ups along the
outside edges of the plate.

He allowed just one
hit in eight innings.

David Justice's solo home run in the sixth
was all the scoring the Braves would need.

To the track, she's gone!

Left center field.

Grissom on the run.

The team of the 90s has
its World Championship.

Baseball was coming back.

I started covering the Yankees
when I was just 18 years old.

Yankees in 1976.

And the insanity that surrounded that
team, with all the Billy Martin firings,

all the Reggie Jackson
incidents, never really stopped.

It was always
beneath the surface.

But the idea that one person could come
into the middle of that, below the level

of the owner, below the level of the
general manager, just as the manager.

Someone who can be undermined.

Someone that you can go over.

And that that person can have so much
sanity, so much decency, so much insight

into how to handle people,
that he can bring sanity to

an inherently insane
situation, is truly impressive.

George Steinbrenner,
the autocratic owner of

the New York Yankees,
had only one objective.

Winning the World Series.

And since the 1970s, he had
spent more than anyone else.

Buying up expensive free agents.

Trading away a lot of money.

Taking away homegrown prospects.

Driving up salaries.

And enraging his fellow owners.

But in spite of his
efforts, the Yankees

had not won a World
Championship since 1978.

In the summer of 1990, Steinbrenner had
been suspended from the team for paying a

small-time hustler for damaging
information about one of his best players,

Dave Winfield.

With Steinbrenner banished,
Yankees general manager

Gene Michael was free
to build a winning club.

He held on to his best young
players and gave them time to develop.

And he looked for seasoned
veterans more concerned

with winning games than
piling up personal statistics.

Michael hired Buck
Showalter to manage the club.

And in 1995, the Yankees made it to the
playoffs for the first time in 14 seasons.

But by then, Steinbrenner
had been reinstated.

And he was not satisfied with
just reaching the postseason.

He replaced Michael, fired Showalter,
and for the 19th time in 23 years,

he began searching
for a new manager.

In 1995, I was fired by
the Cardinals in June.

And when I look back at my
managing career, I managed

the Mets, I managed the
Braves, I managed the Cardinals.

I played for the Cardinals.

I played for the Braves.

I played for the Mets.

I think I ran out of clubs.

The Yankees called.

Joseph Paul Torre was born in the Marine
Park section of Brooklyn, the fifth child

of an Italian immigrant
and her husband, a

hot-headed and sometimes
violent police detective.

As a boy, Torre loved to play ball
with his friends in the neighborhood,

making sure to be out of the
house when his father was around.

His older brother, Frank, would go
on to play for the Milwaukee Braves.

And it was while visiting him
during the 1957 World Series

that Joe Torre decided he, too,
wanted to be a major leaguer.

He eventually played 17 seasons in
the National League as a catcher and

infielder, winning the MVP in 1971,
but never reaching the World Series.

In 14 years as a manager, he
had only five winning seasons.

When the Yankees
decided to take a chance on

Joe Torre, the New York
media were unimpressed.

The Daily News
called him Clueless Joe.

The New York Times
asked, What's a nice

fellow like Torre doing
in a place like this?

I was overwhelmed by the
opportunity that I was going to

be presented here and probably
find out if I could manage.

You know, you're going to deal
with, first off, high-profile ball club.

Tough owner.

And some players I
didn't know anything about.

And when I had my first meeting, I
explained that every single coach on my

coaching staff had
been in the World Series.

I have not.

Well, I thought in 1996 Torre was
the perfect guy for the Yankees.

What would be the worst
thing that would happen to him?

Fired again.

So he came in with this, I'm playing
with the house's money kind of attitude.

And I think that's what
you needed in New York.

Torre's opening day lineup in
1996 included Bernie Williams, a shy,

switch-hitting centerfielder
from Puerto Rico, who scouts

hoped would anchor the Yankee
batting order for years to come.

In right field was the gritty,
tightly-wound veteran Paul O'Neal.

Tino Martinez, a
power-hitting lefty from Florida,

had replaced long-time
first baseman Don Mattingly.

In the bullpen, Tino Martinez was a
promising young reliever from Panama,

Mariano Rivera.

John Wetland, a free agent acquired
from the fading Expos, was the closer.

And at shortstop was a supremely
poised rookie from Kalamazoo, Michigan,

who had dreamed of playing for the
Yankees since the third grade, Derek Jeter.

Holy cow!

His first big league home run.

A lot of people had their doubts
about this kid, especially on defense and

whether he was ready
for the big leagues or not.

And Derek Jeter walked in there like
this was his second time around the big

leagues, like he had
played in this league before.

Nothing bothered him.

Under Torrey, the Yankees played
a National League brand of baseball,

stealing bases, moving
up runners, scuffling

for runs, and
everybody contributed.

The Yankees took control
of the American League East

within a month of opening
day and never surrendered it.

I know people say, well, if you have
good chemistry, you have a chance to win.

I think winning
creates that chemistry.

All of a sudden you find yourselves in a
fight and you look around and you realize

that you can't worry about reading the
newspaper and find out if you're good or

bad or listening to talk
shows to find that out.

You're going to get your confirmation
from those guys sitting in the locker room.

The thing about Torrey was that the
players trust him because he's been a

player and he had been both
a great player and a terrible

player and he always
emphasized how terrible he was.

Every July he would bring up and say,
well, next Tuesday is the anniversary of

the day when I played for the Mets in
1975 and I batted into four double plays.

And the players loved that.

They just loved it.

This absence of ego is
absolutely astounding in any field.

But in sports, I
think it was unique.

He had the players
with which to win.

But the one wild card with the
Yankees was George Steinbrenner.

Joe was maybe the first manager who
over and over again would talk about George

Steinbrenner and he'd
talk about him reverentially.

Hey, he's the boss and
obviously he could fire

me tomorrow and one
day he is going to fire me.

But he's wrong when he
says that about my guys.

And I called him and I
told him that he's wrong.

In the playoffs, the Yankees
dispatched the Texas

Rangers and then beat
Baltimore to win the pennant.

After 34 years and 4,268
games in professional baseball,

Joe Torre was finally
going to the World Series.

You know, the paychecks are pretty good in
Major League Baseball, but if you want to

know what the World Series is about,
all you have to do is look at the face of

Joe Torre when they beat the
Orioles and won the American

League pennant to go to
the World Series in 1996.

He's a grown man
crying in the public.

He basically devoted his
entire adult life to getting there.

No one had ever put in that many
games and never been to a World Series.

He was the only one.

And to finally get there
after all those years.

And I remember him saying the night of
game one of the 1996 World Series when

they announced his name and he ran
out there, that's when it really hit him.

There were no other
games going on.

The out-of-town scoreboard
was completely blank.

And that's when the moment
really hit him that I made it.

This was it.

This was the top of Everest.

The Yankees would face Joe
Torre's old team, the Atlanta

Braves, going for their second
straight World Series title.

In the first game at Yankee Stadium,
the heavily favored Braves pummeled New

York 12-1, the worst World
Series defeat in Yankee history.

George Steinbrenner walks
into my office before game two.

And he says, this is a big game.

Well, yeah, I know.

I know it's a big game.

Only seven games
you get to play here.

And for some reason
I was in a goofy mood.

And I didn't feel the same
stress that I felt later on.

But I said to him,
you know, George?

I said, Maddox is
pitching against us.

We're not really
playing well right now.

We're a little out of whack
because we hadn't played in so long.

I said, we may
lose again tonight.

I said, but we're
going to Atlanta.

That's my town.

I said, we'll win three
there and then next

Saturday we'll come back
and win the series for you.

And I walked out of my office.

Just as Torrey predicted,
Greg Maddox and the

Braves easily beat the
Yankees in game two.

New York needed to win two out of the next
three games in Atlanta just to stay alive.

If you're down two, which is
the way we were, David Cohn

is my pitcher and he's the
only one that had experience.

So I trusted David Cohn.

The son of a Kansas City industrial
mechanic, David Cohn had helped the

Toronto Blue Jays to a World Series
victory over Atlanta back in 1992.

But an aneurysm in his throwing
arm had sidelined him for much of 1996.

And only guile and determination
had allowed him to finish the season.

Cohn quieted the Atlanta
Bats through five innings.

But in the bottom of the
sixth, Cohn loaded the bases.

Fred McGriff, the Braves' fearsome
cleanup hitter, came to the plate.

Normally when a manager goes to the
mound, he's always changing pitchers.

What you do is you send your
pitching coach out once and he

gets that visit over with and
there's really no argument.

The next time you go
out, you take the ball.

But I wanted to go out and
just get a feel for the team.

For David.

Because he, you know, he's
had some problems physically.

And I just wanted to
make sure he was fine.

And I looked in his eyes.

I said, I need you
to tell me the truth.

Are you all right?

He says, I'm okay.

Now, he may not have been okay, but
the commitment he made to me and the

individual that he is, you know, it
was his obligation now to prove it.

A lead-off walk to Tom
Glaff, front of Reigns.

And a one-out walk to
Chipper Jones to load him up.

Off

the hands for Jeter.

Two-out.

Are

either one of you surprised that David
Cohn is staying in with a guy like Rivera

already out in the Yankee
bullpen in a one-run game?

No, I'm not.

I mean, in my ideas, he could
pitch to Lopez still with the lead.

Bases loaded.

Two-out.

To the right side.

It's fouled.

Girardi is there.

Inning over.

Line and right.

Goodbye.

The Yankees scored three
more runs in the eighth inning.

And John Wetland closed
out the Braves in the ninth.

David

Cohn started it.

He gave the Yankees
the start they needed.

In game four, the Braves
took a huge early lead.

And the Yankees fell behind
six-nothing in the middle innings.

And some of the
Braves fans went home.

And I hope they never came back
to another bowl game after that.

do that for the
rest of their lives.

We know we're down three games
to one if we lose this ball game.

And I said, let's just
cut the lead in half.

Let's not eat the whole thing
right now, but let's peck away.

In the top of the sixth inning,
the Yankees began to fight back.

In the top of the eighth inning, with
the Yankees still down three runs,

reserve catcher Jim Lairitz
came to bat with two men on.

He faced reliever Mark
Wolding and two receivers, whose

fastball had once been
clocked at 103 miles per hour.

The two-two to Lairitz.

With two outs in the top of the
tenth, the Yankees loaded the bases.

Torrey had only one position player
left on his bench, but it was Wade Boggs,

one of the most disciplined
hitters in the game.

Boggs with a great
eye at the plate.

He's three-two pitch.

The Yankees take the lead!

Boggs' walk brought
in the go-ahead run.

In the bottom of the 10th, Yankee pitcher
John Whetland kept Atlanta from scoring.

Jones will walk down to second.

Pendleshin shoots
it to deep left.

Range is there,
falling as he can.

At four hours, 17 minutes, it was the
longest game in World Series history.

And this series is tied
at two games apiece.

New York won the next game as well,
just as Torrey had promised Steinbrenner.

And they returned to Yankee
Stadium, needing one more victory.

The sixth game of
the World Series.

Now I'm finally nervous.

Now I've got this
thing in my grasp.

You can almost taste it.

You can almost feel it.

The Yankees took a
3-1 lead into the ninth.

Torrey turned once again
to John Whetland, who had

saved all three Yankee
victories in the series.

And then it comes down to this.

It comes down
to the ninth inning.

Here we are.

Two out.

Lemke's up.

It's a foul pop-up.

Two strikes.

Over toward the dugout.

Charlie Hayes comes over.

He's going to catch it.

He's going to catch it.

It goes in the dugout.

So now you swallow again.

And all of a sudden, the next pitch,
same place, except it looks like it's

going to stay in the field
where you can make a play.

And just as Charlie
Hayes is about to catch the

ball, I just see Jeter's
arms go up in the air.

After 18 years, the Yankees, the most
successful franchise in baseball history,

were back on top.

It was so magical for me that
night that I was just drinking it all in.

And I don't know what
time I left the clubhouse.

And I never bothered
to take my uniform off.

I left the ballpark with
my uniform, drenched.

Yeah, I don't think I've ever
experienced more excitement than that.

The New York Yankees would win the
World Series again in 1998, 1999, and 2000,

sweeping both the San Diego Padres and
the Atlanta Braves, then defeating the New

York Mets in the first
Subway Series since 1956.

The Yankees, the Yankees,
the Yankees, the Yankees.

The Yankees, the
Yankees, the Yankees.

The heart of the
Yankees would remain the

homegrown players they
had so carefully cultivated.

Jorge Posada, Bernie Williams, Mariano
Rivera, Andy Pettit, and Derek Jeter.

Joe Torre, who had once been best known
for the number of games he had played and

managed without reaching the World
Series, would win four in five years.

I grew up hating the Yankees.

I've never been ashamed.

I think it's very clear
that over 90% of all

baseball fans hate the
Yankees and should.

And that the best state
for baseball to be in is for

the Yankees to be a contender
and then lose in the end.

However, in the late 90s, not only because
of Torre being the manager and Don Zimmer

being part of the operation, but of just
scrappy, smart players like O'Neal and

Knobloch and the fact that they showed
people how you play, both small ball and

big ball, how you work the
count, how you play team

baseball and win four
to three, not nine to one.

They were a wonderful team to
watch, and it was a bitter pill for me.

But I did realize that it was my job to
get over the hump, and I think that there

was about a three-year period
back there when I successfully

swallowed the bile and gave
credit where credit was due.

And that Yankee team will probably
be, ironically, the best team I ever cover.

That's quite
unfortunate, isn't it?

Growing up as a
Mexican-American kid in Northern

California, there weren't
a lot of positive images.

And then in baseball,
there was Roberto Clemente.

And the 71 series
was an epiphany for me

because he just
controlled that World Series.

He seemed to jump
off the TV screen.

But when the series was
over and he spoke in Spanish,

it was really something for me to
see somebody recognizing his parents.

I say in English,
I would like to say

something for my mother
and father in Spanish.

He was so ramrod straight.

He spoke with so much pride.

He was so passionate
about his career.

And he carried
himself in a certain way.

And he reminded me of people in my life
who I knew, who I respected, who I admired.

Roberto Clemente had come
north from the cane fields of

Puerto Rico to become
baseball's first great Latin star.

His fierce pride and dignity, an
inspiration for an entire generation.

Although Clemente and many other Latin
players of his era played with tremendous

flair and brought an electrifying
intensity to the game, it was not until

the 1980s that major league
teams began to fully open their

doors to talented players
from outside the United States.

As free agency drove up salaries and
signing bonuses for native-born players,

teams turned to Latin America, where
young prospects were not subject to

the baseball draft and
could therefore be procured

for a fraction of what
they would cost in America.

Every team spends millions and millions
of dollars to cultivate those players.

And the reason that
they want to cultivate them

is because you can get
more players cheaper there.

In a sense, it's no different than the
first wave of integration with Robinson,

where coming out of the Negro
Leagues, the African-American

player was the cheapest
commodity available.

And you could cultivate
those players the same

way you can cultivate
the Latino player today.

You can get more for less.

Scouts fanned out across the
Latin American and Caribbean

countries where baseball
was played and revered.

The Dominican Republic, Panama,
Nicaragua, Venezuela, and Colombia.

Only Cuba was off-limits.

By the late 1980s,
Latin players could be

found at all levels of
the national pastime.

More came from the Dominican
Republic, an impoverished

Caribbean nation of only 9
million, than anywhere else.

It was said that no
one walks off the island.

You have to hit your way off.

Thousands of Dominican boys with
raw talent, but little formal training,

vied to attract the attention of buscones,
local scouts who coach children as young

as 10, honing their skills, offering them
gloves, bats and shoes, food, vitamins,

and even performance-enhancing supplements
to help them grow strong enough to compete.

If a boy was lucky enough at 16 to
sign with an American team, his buscone

negotiated his contract
and helped himself to

a hefty cut of the
prospect's signing bonus.

The Los Angeles Dodgers and the Toronto
Blue Jays were the first teams to reap the

benefits of recruiting and training
large numbers of Dominican players.

They built baseball academies designed
to prepare the hundreds of young boys they

had signed for professional baseball
and for living in the United States.

It was really difficult
for me to adjust.

And then the people at the
academy told us, it's going to be tough.

Don't be crying, don't be
saying you miss this or that.

You got it.

You got to get strong.

Sometimes I really did.

Even though they told
us, I was really homesick

because I used to be
with my mom all the time.

Sometimes, you know, I'd just sneak in my
mom's bed and sleep with my mom sometimes

and talk to her and do
the gardening with her.

When I didn't know her well enough,
I didn't think I could come to her.

I'd work on her
social playfiction.

We didn't have those things
and everything was just

baseball, bus rides for
12 hours and then pitch.

It was really difficult.

You say, wow, I'm
going to America.

I'm going to play
baseball in America.

And you're expecting all these
big buildings and big highways.

Stuff that you see in
movies and magazines.

And you were dreaming,
you know, to come to a huge

city like New York or
Chicago or something like that.

And when we got to Butte, Montana,
we didn't really see too many people.

I remember that I went
there with a friend of mine.

We both signed from Venezuela.

And when we got there, it's like, are
we really in the United States or what?

The pitch to him and
he chops it towards short.

Pascal, bare hand grab.

The throw.

It's in time.

Planteer.

Oh, what a play by Galarraga.

And a double.

In the hole, Ordonez
with a long throw.

What a circle.

A drive deep right field.

Bautista, look.

Yeah, good one.

In 1997, 15 of the players chosen to
play in the All-Star Game were Latin,

including Pedro Martinez, Edgar
Martinez, Moises Alou, Andres Galarraga,

Roberto and Sandy Alomar, Mariano
Rivera, Ivan Rodriguez, and Alex Rodriguez.

Three of the five most common
surnames in recent years

in baseball have been
Rodriguez, Martinez, and Perez.

It's just another wave of immigration, if
you will, in making baseball a world sport.

And he hits the ground
ball on the right side.

As Hispanic players became
increasingly prominent, the

media began to highlight
their inspiring rise from poverty.

Very, very deep.

And...

And few big leaguers could lay claim to
a childhood filled with greater privation

than Sammy Sosa.

He grew up desperately poor.

And fatherless.

In the Dominican sugar
mill town of San Pedro de

Macaris, birthplace of
dozens of major leaguers.

He scuffled for odd jobs, shined shoes to
bring a few centavos home to his mother,

and idolized Roberto Clemente.

Sosa was fast, skinny but
strong, and determined, and

attracted the notice of a scout
who signed him for $3,500.

Sosa worked his way up through the minors,
and played for two different big league

clubs, before eventually
landing a three-year,

$16 million contract
with the Chicago Cubs.

Sammy Sosa.

He would have
been a day laborer.

He would have been someone
who would have come to New

York as an undocumented
immigrant, but for baseball.

It's one thing to talk about...

living through hunger.

It's another thing
to actually do it.

To be hungry.

And he was hungry as a child.

Really hungry.

Not hungry to be a successful
player, but he was hungry.

As in, I don't have enough food.

And so it was those
experiences that really drove him.

And really drove him to be a great success,
and I believe, later brought him down.

Thousands in Latin America dreamed of
growing up to become the next Sammy Sosa.

But only a tiny fraction
of those signed by

American teams ever
made it to the major leagues.

Most could look forward
to a season or two in the

minors before being given
a plane ticket back home.

Hey,

we're going to throw
the ball in one action.

When I'm in the big leagues, I
think I'm going to feel a little fulfilled.

And not only when I get
there, but when I stay.

Because...

You have faith.

I've seen a lot of people that have
arrived and haven't been able to stay.

My dream is to stay
in the big leagues.

And when I do, I'll be
able to help my family

and I'll be able to
do everything I want.

If I get to the big leagues,
it's going to be great, imagine.

I'm going to be able to have everything
I've wanted, everything I've wanted.

For everything I've played,
everything I've fought for.

I'm going to be
there, in my hands.

I'm going to have fame.

I'm going to have the people.

I'm going to be
surrounded by people

The vast majority of Latin American
players will not reach the big leagues.

You can either hit Uncle
Charlie or you can't.

You have movement or you don't,
or you can throw 90 or you can't.

These kids have been
programmed in their

own minds that they're
not going to go back.

There's nothing to go back to.

So what happens is they stay.

And there's these great leagues,
semi-pro leagues, particularly in New York.

Central Park,
Brooklyn, the Bronx.

And you're seeing all these guys,
and you go to these games, and they're

cool to watch because you see little
flashes of what I'm sure the scouts saw.

But it's not quite there.

They're not there.

They're not quite fast enough.

They don't quite
throw hard enough.

There's just a little bit too
big of a hole in their swing.

We're live here in Azorilla,
Brooklyn, New York.

2-2 is the count, running
on first base every weekend.

Great baseball here in Brooklyn.

It's an aspect of capitalism.

There are winners
and there are losers.

These kids would have
never given up the opportunity.

And for a lot of them,
some of them can't watch

baseball anymore because
it's too painful for them.

This is the golden age
for a number of reasons.

First place baseball is the
most observable team game.

Nine players thinly dispersed over
an eye-pleasing green background.

And baseball rediscovered
in the first place.

In the 90s, the ballpark,
which is a setting for this jewel.

Throughout the 1990s, as the economy
boomed and the national pastime continued

to recover from the
strike, baseball found a

new old way to bring
fans back to the game.

It had all started in Baltimore, on
the waterfront, with Camden Yards.

With its brick façade and asymmetrical
outfield fence, it was a welcome departure

from the sterile concrete suburban stadiums
that had been built in the early 1970s.

People came in droves.

Over the next eighteen years, ninety other
clubs would replace their stadiums with

cosy new ball parks, publicly financed
architectural acts of faith that many

hoped would rehabilitate
the fading economies of their

inner cities as much as
the fortunes of their teams.

Unlike

the old stadiums they were meant to To
evoke the new parks replaced inexpensive

seats with luxury boxes that catered to
well-heeled corporate executives and the

high tech millionaires America seemed to
be minting every day as the new parks were

built attendance continue to rise around
the leagues and so did the number of home

runs that was soaring over the fences a no
hitter is a rare thrill wrote the New York

Times but nothing quite captures
the imagination like a home run.

Cecil Fielder hit 50 home runs in 1990 and
before that it hadn't been done since 1977

so when you go back and you look at the
rarity of the 50 home run season it was it

was it was as remarkable as as a no-hitter
and even more so and then all of a sudden

it became commonplace home runs at
The game had spiked before, but this was

quantitatively and
qualitatively different.

And many started asking
whether smaller parks alone

could account for the
dramatic change in the game.

Name me one innovation over the
past 20 years that has helped the pitcher.

Everything has
helped the hitter.

This game is so far out of
balance toward the hitter that that's

one of the biggest reasons why
you have so many home runs.

The ballparks are smaller.

The strike zones are smaller.

You can't pitch inside.

You can't knock a hitter down
anymore without getting into a brawl.

Everything helps the hitter.

In 1992, Major League players
had hit a total of 3,038 home runs.

Just four years
later, they hit 4,962.

Fans loved it.

Some purists were not pleased.

Baseball went through a period
of get two runners on base,

get Godzilla to the plate,
have him hit it into Tokyo Bay.

That ball was
completely destroyed.

The problem is, in baseball it's not
always true what Mae West said when she

said too much of a
good thing is wonderful.

For 37 years, Roger
Maris had held the record

for the most home
runs in a single season.

61.

Few had even come
close to breaking it.

But as the 1998 season
approached, two sluggers

seemed to have a legitimate
chance at Maris' mark.

The Seattle Mariners star
center fielder Ken Griffey

Jr., who had hit 56 home
runs the year before.

And a man who seemed
specifically constructed

for this new assault
on the old record.

The shy son of a dentist from Southern
California, Mark McGuire excelled at

baseball in high school,
but took a year off

from the game as a
junior to pursue golf.

Where, he said, you were the only one
there to blame when something went wrong.

In 1987, his first full season with the
Oakland Athletics, McGuire had belted 49

home runs, breaking
the rookie record by 11.

The following year, he began
training with teammate Jose Canseco.

The duo became known
as the Bash Brothers.

For their soaring home
runs and the forearm

bump they exchanged
after each towering blast.

The two sluggers led the A's to
the World Series three years in a row.

Over the next few seasons, McGuire
continued to add muscle to his already

massive frame and spent
months on the disabled list with

frequent injuries to his
overstrained joints and tendons.

But when healthy, he hit balls out
of the park with astonishing force.

In 1995, he hit 39 home
runs in only 104 games.

In 1996, he smashed 52 in 130 games,
better than one in every nine at-bats.

It was then that sports writers
and fans began to wonder

if McGuire might be the
one to eclipse Roger Maris.

If he could manage to stay
healthy for an entire season.

Midway through 1997, looking to cut
costs, the A's traded McGuire to the St.

Louis Cardinals where he was reunited with
his old Oakland manager, Tony La Russa.

He finished the season
with 58 home runs.

Something happened when
that guy landed in St. Louis.

He went from playing before empty
stadiums in Oakland to full stadiums in St.

Louis, arguably the best
baseball town in America.

He looks like something
straight out of American folklore.

I mean, immediately, he
was embraced by the fans.

McGuire launched his first home run
of 1998 on March 31st, a grand slam.

On April 14th, he hit his
fifth, sixth, and seventh.

Ken Griffey kept pace, and by
the end of April, they were tied at 11.

Then McGuire took off.

A home run on May
12th traveled 527 feet.

Another on May 16th went 545.

On May 19th, he hit three.

And on May 23rd,
he hit two more.

It sounds crazy now, but
looking back on it, one of the

highlights of that season
was watching batting practice.

It was a show.

Teams would come out early for stretching
to make sure they watched McGuire catch.

He would take batting practice.

I'll never forget, he would step in
and he would always bunt the first pitch.

And people would boo.

And then he would proceed to put on
a show like you've never seen before.

You could have gone home
before the first pitch and had your

money's worth watching Mark
McGuire take batting practice.

McGuire finished
May with 27 home runs.

He was a full month
ahead of Marris' 1961 pace.

Ken Griffey Jr.
struggled to keep up.

Then from out of nowhere,
another slugger joined the chase.

Sammy Sosa might have had a big contract,
but he had never lived up to his potential.

Although the now bulked up slugger
had hit 40 home runs in 1996, he remained

undisciplined at the plate, often hacking
at balls well outside the strike zone.

One sports writer wrote,
Sosa would attack a

paper cup if it came
floating toward home plate.

Sosa had a good year statistically in
1997, but he struck out a lot and really

was an object of derision on the Cubs
because he had signed this big contract.

And they felt like his
numbers were hollow.

The Cubs hitting coach had devised a plan
to help Sosa become a more patient batter.

They would do this repetition drill where
they would throw the ball and Sammy would

tap his foot on the ground
as like a loading device.

To load his body.

And then he would follow through
with his foot and then just connect.

And it was just this one little motion,
this little hitch that they had changed in

his swing that took him from Sammy Sosa,
the really good player who maybe was a

little overrated, to Sammy
Sosa, the superstar.

It all came together in June.

He hit home runs on
June 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th.

Each one punctuated by
an exuberant sideways skid.

And a skipping home run trot.

On the 15th, he hit three.

On the 19th, he hit two.

On the 25th, he smashed
his 19th home run

of the month, breaking
a 50-year-old record.

By June 30th, he had 33.

Only four fewer
than Mark McGuire.

Mark who?

We'd always looked at the
game as a black or white game.

We looked at America
as a black or white country.

Those of us who don't fit
the description knew that

wasn't true, but we didn't
have the example to point to.

And then when Sammy Sosa
exploded in June of 1998, there it was.

You both come from such
different backgrounds as children.

Could you ever have envisioned
yourself sitting in this setting?

Not really, but I have to say, baseball
has been very, very good to me.

While McGuire
seemed to want to be left

alone, Sosa was
having the time of his life.

His thousand-watt smile, his palpable
sense of joy in what he was doing,

enthralled the public.

By the 4th of July, America had
fallen in love with Sammy Sosa.

No Latin player, not even Clemente or
the Dodgers' great Mexican pitcher of the

1980s, Fernando Valenzuela,
had ever before received

such an outpouring of
affection and admiration.

The players, with all
the money they were

making, they made
baseball seem like drudgery.

Like it was a job.

And so Sammy Sosa
was like a throwback.

He loved the game, and
he wasn't afraid to show it.

He was reminding people
why they loved baseball.

That it was supposed to be fun.

And he had so much fun.

By mid-summer, the home-run contest
had become front-page news, with hordes of

reporters now trailing both
sluggers everywhere they went.

Millions got caught
up in the excitement.

In St. Louis and Chicago, Caracas and
San Juan, Tokyo and Santo Domingo,

they couldn't get enough
of Sosa and Maguire.

People, when they woke up in the morning,
they wanted to know, did Maguire hit one?

Did Sammy hit one?

It was a constant update.

And everybody had
a horse in the race.

I got caught up in it.

I was rooting for Sammy
as much as I was rooting

for Maguire, because
he's such a nice gentleman.

And Sammy is my countryman.

And I really became a fan.

I was like, how many
did they hit today?

How many?

You know, sometimes when I was pitching,
as soon as the game was over, turned on

one of the sports channels
and said, how many did they hit?

Oh, oh my God, they're
going to break a record.

Innocence is
beautiful sometimes.

In Chicago, one Sosa
blast sailed out of Wrigley

Field and struck a front
porch across the street.

The owners put up a sign
reading, Sammy was here.

In Milwaukee, fans booed when St.
Louis' backup first baseman took the field

instead of Maguire, who
had been given a rare day off.

When Maguire came to Pittsburgh,
the Pirates had the first back-to-back

regular season sellouts in the
27-year history of Three Rivers Stadium.

On August 10th, Sosa smashed
his 46th of the season, and for

the first time since opening
day, the two sluggers were tied.

The president testifies.

A special edition of NBC
Nightly News from Washington.

We have learned that the president
did indeed tell Ken Starr that he had an

inappropriate relationship
with Monica Lewinsky.

To a country transfixed by the revelation
that the president had cheated on his

wife, and lied about it, Mark Maguire and
Sammy Sosa provided a welcome distraction.

But then, Steve Willstein, a reporter
covering Maguire for the Associated Press,

broke a story that cast doubt on
the legitimacy of the home run chase.

You know, I was standing
by Maguire's locker in St.

Louis, waiting for him to
come out of the shower.

And there were about a
dozen or more reporters there.

And these are open stalls.

And on his top shelf, he's
got a picture of his son.

And there's also this bottle
of something I didn't know.

And I wrote down the
name of it just in my notes.

It spelled out androstenedione.

Androstenedione was marketed
as a nutritional supplement.

Because it raised
testosterone levels, it would

eventually be classified
as an anabolic steroid.

But thanks to government
deregulation, it was sold over the counter.

I remember thinking, how
do you spell androstenedione?

We knew nothing
about a drug like that.

It was very new on the radar.

And I remember looking it up and not really
understanding, what the heck is this?

I can't say there was
a complete surprise.

There had been rumors out there.

And of course, Maguire denied
it, said he knew nothing about it.

But this was something tangible.

This was a bottle of
something in that locker.

Something that should have made us
question a little deeper, what does it do?

And what is going on
outside of just that one locker?

Because certainly he
couldn't be the only person.

Andro, as it was called, had
already been banned by the

National Football League and
International Olympic Committee.

And General Nutrition Centers had pulled
it from their shelves two months earlier.

But Major League Baseball
said they didn't know

anything about it and
had no rule against its use.

In Milwaukee, Bud Selig visited his local
drug store in search of the supplement.

I went to our pharmacy
in Milwaukee, walked in.

The pharmacist yelled, right
over there, commissioner.

I said, how do
you know I'm here?

He said, I can
read the paper too.

And he said, it's legal?

You can buy it?

I said, what is it?

I never heard of it.

When this happened, I said, oh boy, the
whole home run chase has been tainted now.

It's been ruined.

And the exact opposite happened.

And what happened was that Steve
Willstein actually turned into the bad guy.

He became the villain.

And it was an example of how
powerful the baseball machine could be.

And when I say machine,
I mean the writers as well.

When they wanted
to crush a story.

Instead of being introspective and instead
of being investigative, instead of looking

at this as a moment to consider steroids
as a possibility for some of the offense

in baseball, the response instead
was to vilify Steve completely unfairly.

Tony La Russa said he should be
banned from the clubhouse for life.

And he didn't have a lot
of allies in the press either.

The idea was shoot
the messenger.

There was certainly not an
embracing of the issue that

we have a problem and we
need to solve this problem.

There was no sense in baseball
that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

We need to look further to see who else
is using performance enhancing drugs.

If anything, it was more
bury our heads in the sand.

Maybe it'll go away.

A columnist for the Boston Globe insisted
there's nothing sold in drugstores that

can help you hit a home
run in the big leagues.

Andro, he wrote, was not that
different from aspirin, prime rib, coffee,

or Wheaties.

And McGuire was just the victim of
an unfair tabloid-driven controversy.

I don't think he was
just taking Andro.

I think Andro was one
of many drugs that he

was probably taking
for a long period of time.

And just a couple weeks earlier,
Randy Barnes, the gold medalist shot

putter for the United States, was
banned for life for using Androstenedione.

And here was McGuire
being praised as the hero

of the country, using
the exact same thing.

It wasn't something that I
was getting on McGuire about.

It's just that it was seen outside of
baseball as cheating and dangerous.

And so why was
baseball doing this?

That's the beginning
of when you start

thinking, what are we
going to do about this?

But you're sort of contradicting
your own desire in a

funny kind of way, not only
professional, but personal.

On the one hand, you
think, do I find out about this?

On the other hand, you're thinking,
do I really want to find out about this?

I mean, I'm not here to
tear sports down for fans.

I'm here to make
sports joyous for fans.

And so you're living
in that contradiction.

McGuire himself
was unapologetic.

Everybody that I
know in the game of

baseball uses the
same stuff I use, he said.

If somebody tells me that it's illegal
and I shouldn't be taking it, I will stop.

Sales of Andro exploded.

Fans and other players
seemed unconcerned.

McGuire and Sosa continued hitting
home runs at a record-breaking clip.

The controversy faded away.

By early September,
Sosa had hit 58 home runs.

McGuire had equaled
Babe Ruth's old record of 60.

The Cubs arrived in St.
Louis for a two-game series.

And despite the scandal in Washington,
baseball was all anybody could talk about.

Scalpers charged $400 for box seats,
even more for the left-field bleachers,

where they expected
each historic shot to land.

There were rumors that
a record-breaking ball

might sell for as much
as a million dollars.

Roger Marris was no
longer living, but his two

daughters and four
sons were in the stands.

So were Commissioner Bud Selig
and Cardinal great Stan Musial.

The pack of reporters that
had been trailing each slugger

for weeks crowded into Busch
Stadium, ready to provide news.

It was a moment-to-moment
coverage.

In the Dominican Republic,
millions gathered around

television sets and radios
to follow Sosa's at-bats.

The streets were as empty, one fan said,
as when the government decrees a curfew.

On September 7,
McGuire went right to work.

The next night, McGuire came to the
plate with two outs in the fourth inning.

Roger Marris had
needed all 162 games of

the 1961 season to
break Babe Ruth's record.

It took McGuire only 145.

St. Louis is a tremendous
baseball town, where, as someone

put it, you get this combination
of passion and civility.

You don't find
many other places.

This is a place where
they gave Sosa a standing

ovation on the weekend
when McGuire broke the record.

McGuire and Sosa embrace.

A kid, a groundskeeper,
comes up with the ball.

And in an era when everybody sells
everything, the kid shows up on the field,

and his unscripted line is, Mr. McGuire,
I have something that belongs to you.

Roger Marris's family there.

McGuire could not
have been more gracious.

Now, if some of that doesn't touch your
heart, you shouldn't be a baseball fan.

And because of all that, a lot of us
said, something here, wait a minute.

He hits 62 home
runs in 440 at-bats?

Ruth hits 60 in 540?

Marris hits 61 in 590?

It's a little fishy, but okay.

Okay.

The race was not over yet.

There were still nearly
three weeks to go.

Sammy Sosa passed Roger Marris on
September 13th, and the two sluggers

entered the final weekend
of the season tied at 65.

On Friday night in St. Louis,
McGuire hit a 375-foot shot.

In Houston, Sosa blasted
one that went 462 feet.

On Saturday, McGuire
slugged two more.

Sosa singled twice, leading the Cubs to a
win, but he failed to hit another home run.

On the final day of the
season, McGuire put

the finishing touches
on his historic year.

In the third inning, he
hit his 69th home run.

In the seventh, he came
to the plate for the last time.

First and third, two out.

In the last

11 minutes, he
hit five home runs.

And on each one, we're looking at
each other in the press box saying,

do you believe this?

I mean, it's very
hard to hit a home run.

But it's very hard to do it
when everybody expects you

to hit one, and yet he
seemed to be doing it on cue.

Sosa finished the
season with 66 home runs.

He may have lost the contest with McGuire,
but he had become a worldwide celebrity.

And back home in the Dominican
Republic, he was given a hero's welcome.

1998 had been Major League
Baseball's best season ever.

McGuire and Sosa's accomplishments,
wrote a reporter for the New York Times,

were the equivalent of a large dose
of Prozac, temporarily lifting the country

from depressing
developments in the capital.

But one player
remained decidedly.

As far as he was concerned, far too
much attention had been lavished on two

pumped-up sluggers with
far less talent than he had.

He had never aspired to
break Roger Marris' record.

Instead, he had dreamed of becoming
the greatest all-around player, and had set

his sights on being the first to hit
400 home runs and steal 400 bases.

On August 23, 1998, as the
frenzied New York Times reported,

the history of the home run
contest was nearing its climax.

Barry Bonds had achieved
that extraordinary feat.

But news of his accomplishment was
relegated to the back of the sports pages.

Frustrated that home runs were the only
thing that mattered, he now resolved to do

whatever it took to win the
respect he thought he deserved.

The bottom line with Barry was
he watched Sosa, and he watched

McGuire, and he saw the
adulation that they got in 1998.

He saw them getting credit for rebuilding
the game coming out of the strike when he

knew he was twice the
player of either one of them.

And when he decided to balance the scales,
now we really saw something remarkable.