The age-old philosophy question asks, "If a tree falls in the forest, and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?"
Modern sports philosophy may beg the question, "If a ballplayer breaks a long-standing mark for home runs, but he's the second player in a week to do it, will anybody pay any attention?"
Sammy Sosa's 62nd home run Sunday night may become known as the Shot Ignored 'Round the World.
Now understandably, there are some reasons why Sosa's shot did not receive nearly the amount of attention that Mark McGwire's 62nd did last Tuesday night. After all, McGwire was the first person to break Roger Maris's 37-year-old record. It was McGwire who was the preseason favorite to eclipse the mark, the one who has been tracked with Maris since opening day this season.
All year it has been, how many homers does McGwire have? How many did Maris have at this point in '61? Sosa didn't start receiving attention until his record-setting 20 home runs in June pulled him within sight of McGwire, though Sosa never managed to pass the Cardinals' slugger for more than a few hours. Monday morning marked the first time all season that the sun has risen with the two sluggers tied.
But there must be more reason than that for the explanation as to why Sammy Sosa is constantly placing second to McGwire in the national spotlight. When McGwire broke the record, the Maris family was in the stands. Bud Selig, commissioner of baseball, was there. Bill Clinton called McGwire to congratulate him. And the Cardinals presented McGwire with a shiny red '62 convertible for his achievement.
Sosa's blast received none of that attention, even though it came in the bottom of the ninth with his team down two runs, and helped propel the Cubs to another come-from-behind victory and kept them ahead in the wild-card race.
Okay, so McGwire was the first to hit No. 62. McGwire is also the Gentle Giant, the man with the affable personality and huge biceps who doesn't just clear the fence, but sometimes the zip code too. And McGwire is the one who has overcome injury and personal struggle to be able to hug his batboy son as he touches home plate on the record-breaking shot.
Oh, yeah-McGwire is also white. If anything, this summer McGwire has become the symbol of America, at least of Baseball Watching America. He's big, he's strong and he plays America's pastime in the nation's heartland. Ever been to a baseball game? The skin color of the stands in most major-league cities is about as white as the leather of a brand-new baseball sent rocketing over the leftfielder by McGwire.
Sosa? He's the boy from the Dominican Republic who used to shine shoes. He's the guy who plays ball in the Polish city of Chicago, speaking Spanglish in interviews. On ESPN's Sportscenter, anchor Stuart Scott has become fond of announcing every blast by Sosa by imitating Sosa's Spanish accent and saying, "This country been very very good to me." By contrast, some of the anchors on the same show have begun calling the program "McGwireCenter."
Now the point of this column is not to accuse the American sports media of racism, conscious or otherwise. Race is only one possible explanation as to why McGwire is currently America's Hero, while Sosa, the favorite for National League MVP, stands in his shadow. But make no mistake-race is definitely a factor in the different acceptance levels that Americans have toward the two sluggers.
The common retort to this statement is that McGwire was the first one to hit No. 62, and that made the American people stop caring as much. But is Sporting America's attention-span that short? Is the home-run chase last week's news already? Is it possible that American culture, so caught up with the horse-race story in politics and sports, saw McGwire cross that 62 finish line first and simply lessened its interest in the story?
It can't be that simple.
McGwire's white mom-and-apple-pie persona represents the Hero figure of the 1990s for middle America. He's enormous in size. He's powerful. If McGwire were a car, he'd be a 4x4 truck. He's also socially conscious, using his money and fame to fight child abuse. And he plays the fallen hero, the warrior with a weakness. Sports Illustrated wrote this year about how he missed his son and was lonely in St. Louis.
When a reporter dug up a bottle of Andro in his locker, he was forced to defend himself when people talked about a "tainted" record. People were forced to either condemn him or defend him, and in doing so, McGwire's hero status was elevated.
Sosa, on the other hand, would be better suited to chase the record in the 19th century. He's an entirely different brand of hero, straight out of a Horatio Alger novel. He came out of a small Dominican town where he shined shoes, immigrated to America, learned English and pulled himself up by the proverbial bootstraps. He's the one who should be proving that anyone can make it in America.
But have we grown tired of that story? Has the pendulum swung the other way, to the point where we have become more interested in home-grown sensations than in the immigrant tale?
Perhaps this is the case. Perhaps the American baseball fan doesn't want to see a Dominican stealing the spotlight. This is the record of Ruth and Maris, both Caucasians who played for the Yankees, which were then, as now, America's team. In the same way that some resented Hank Aaron taking the career home-run record from Ruth, the idea of Sosa owning the home-run crown might be subconsciously offensive to some sports fans, who want the record to stay within America's boundaries.
Is this fair? Of course not. Sosa deserves every ounce of the attention and praise that McGwire has received. Sosa has overcome his own personal struggle; he's a player who has led the league in strikeouts, who this season taught himself to be more patient, to wait on pitches, to be willing to settle for a walk or a single. He's ahead of McGwire in batting average, RBI and runs scored, and he has kept his team in the wild-card hunt while McGwire's talented Cardinal team has underachieved. But there it was on ESPN last night-an ad hawking special commemorative Mark McGwire baseballs, stamped with a 62 and the date he hit his historic blast.
In all likelihood, whichever of these incredible hitters comes out on top will be the one who goes down in history. But along the way, it is imperative that we give appropriate respect and attention to both Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa as the two most prolific single-season home-run hitters in history.
Zachary Davis is a Trinity senior and associate sports editor of The Chronicle.
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