Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa's race for home run history deserves a deep rewind 

I also love that Sammy was the first ever to 66 and that's where he finished in '98. Was his single season best, too.

It was an insane feat

And that occurred in a 4 year stretch where the one season that he "only" hit 50 homers was the one where he did lead the league.

Sounds like the Drew Brees of MLB.

​@@jeyfromnowhereand that was the only time all year he had the home run lead by himself. It lasted 45 minutes.

Couldn't have said it better

🤔

I really wish jr would have hit 62+ to have staked claim to the "asterisk free" record.

Steroids didn't help these players hit the ball better. They were all exceptionally talented. Griffey was one of the ones who didn't participate. MLB needed something to bring in casual people.

no way you spewed that sentence up and thought you were right@@AnthonyMcNeil

Right I was 11 and just falling in love with baseball ⚾️

Watching the numbers race in the newspaper.. ah, nostalgia

Logic: Unfortunately, reality can often be disappointing.

If you assume any of them aren’t on steroids, or that it magically turns you into superman without absolutely insane work ethic and discipline, and you still have maybe a hair’s chance of making it, you’re still ignorant.

I was old enough to know the concept of steroids, I just didn't care. Older me cares even less. Sports are just entertainment.

Ken was jacked up on beenies, coke and meth every game so what's the difference boy? You take the uppers away from Kenny GJ and all you have is Andrew Benintendi.

I wouldn't assume anyone is clean.

@@Ycjedi I wouldn't either, but the information that is available indicates he is clean.

@@3411Chad The information available indicates that the elections was rigged son!! Barry Bonds did nine 11? What about tower 7 then son?! I'm just asking questions based on the information available to me.

@@3411Chadshould’ve took them tbh would’ve prolonged his body’s collapse when he was on the refs

94 season was his best chance he was on pace for 64 but season ended, just show how horrible the 94 lockout was

And Expos had an "All-Star" team and were totally screwed

Kenny Jay McGriffy wasn't clean son... that dude was known to do quite a bit of blow and take them Stacker 3 pills during games.... you know the pills I'm talmbout son? Big Riggin Cross CuontryTruckers and ER Doctors pop those things to stay awake 24 hours straight and Kenny was just poppin them things down like effin candy before and during games... dude was totes jacked up to his balls, bee whole and beyond boy!!!

Hahaha dude was jacked up to the wazoo but still loved the Kid!

@@DanielSong39 My sea men has been registered as a performance inhancing substance in most states that Billy Maze and Kenny G played in back then so...good chance he was chuggin' down some of my heated sea men on the regular son!!

u mean Aaron Jury

1993-2004 was the greatest and most memorable era in MLB history. So much happened during this era. Ironically, the peak of the PED era

Do you have a link or time stamps? I'm kinda interested in hearing that call now. 👀

@@Toblehrone Honestly, I haven't watched that version in a while, so I'm not sure of the exact timestamp (or even an estimated one, as the split-screens only happen when they're on the air). So, if you're interested, and you've got a few hours to burn, you will have to search for it on here and watch the entire thing. (It is during a break, so you could just skim through the video until you don't see any on-screen graphics, then try to listen for it.)

I believe they were legally allowed by MLB at the time so he wasn't doing anything "wrong"

Andro was definitely not against any MLB rules at the time, as it was sold legally as an OTC. Other sporting bodies had classified it as an anabolic steroid, but that is irrelevant to this case.

Andro was not a steroid. It was a mild test "booster" which is not to be confused at all with exogenous testosterone injections which raise your total testosterone levels. "Boosters" only give a temporary boost to levels of "free testosterone" which lasts a couple hours and have zero effect on total test levels or levels of blood serum test. I've been a bodybuilder for over 20 years so I'm very familiar and educated on anabolics as they are as much a part of bodybuilding as a protein shake. What people need to realize is that steroids did not break that record, they simply gave an edge to guys that were already elite level athletes at the highest level of their sport. If it were just a matter of juicing up, than anyone could conceivably start taking them and hit 70 HR's. In that era it wasn't just Mac and Sosa, it was likely 80% of the league...pitchers included, and still only 2 men were able to hit 60+.

​@@stevewilliams1176This is such an utterly horseshit take... 🤦 The home run rates would have been way, WAAAAAAAAY lower in the late 90's if no one had been juicing. Also Andro most DEFINITELY wasn't the only thing Mark was taking... There's a reason basically every baseball production stat exploded during the 90's. BALCO and others like it had basically every major player running steroid cycles, alternating with some test boosters (ala Andro/etc...) and HGH to recover after having got so shut-down. Rinse, repeat, get massive, and then slug balls like the world had never seen before (simply changing steroids everytime MLB would come up with a way to test for the latest anabolic hotness). The only reason Mark was able to break a record nobody could for DECADES prior is that he had a MAJOR medical advantage that prior JUST AS TALENTED sluggers didn't. End of story. 🤷

@@Cooe. Did you even read what I wrote? I said about 80% of the league was juicing at that time yet only 2 guys were hitting 60+ HR's. The talent had to be there first. McGwire was a HR hitter already and like I said, added an "edge" by taking test and deca which allowed him to recover to play enough games to break a record he had been "on pace" to break multiple years of his career when one injury or another sidelined him. My only mention of Andro was stating that it was not a steroid (and it wasn't)...I didn't say anything about McGwire not taking anything else. Obviously he was. Again, I've been a bodybuilder for over 20 years....read between the lines there. That said, if it were strictly about PED's then several "sluggers" would have been threatening that record. The talent had to be there first. McGwire showed from his Rookie year on that when healthy he was, at minimum, a 50+ HR guy. Hell, had he not played in Oakland, the worst park in the Bigs to hit HR's in during those years, he may have hit 61 his Rookie season...completely clean. I've never, repeat, never said McGwire didn't use. I knew then he was juicing. I'm just saying his ability was already there to begin with...that part, along with steroid use, is undeniable. Also, just an FYI....HGH has no impact on test levels (you mention it regarding recovery from shut down). If a person is cycling exogenous testosterone, he would need a drug like Nolvadex to recover natural test production.

Yeah but, what was your first child abuse memory? That's what I think people up in here deserve to know about son.

Same age and same feeling!

@@patrickwaclaw You were abused as a child as well? Sexually?

I was 8 living in rural Wyoming. Even there, people were excited about Sosa/McGwire, enough for me to vivdly remember it and click on this video.

@@jennyanydots2389probably when he went to the synagogue and met the rabbi

Did ur daddy ever beet yo ass in hard when them Cubbies beet the Cards? Good thing the Cards usually win that rivalry otherwise yo daddy prolly have beetin yo ass in too hard and start beetin them teeth right out ur stupid mouf boy!!

Great story

@@thegamebastard Did you get along with your dad? Me neither.

These races!! The hall of fame is a pit of despair full of joo's, races, and ugly whites who totes dead now anyway. I should be in HOF son!!

Given that the substances they were taking were legal, that they made it public, and that they had a generally good relationship with the media through all of it, yeah, absolutely. Their career numbers would also back up their Cooperstown case, even if their rejuvenation of the league didn't speak for itself.

MLB doesn't have to adhere to the same standards of the law as the federal or state government, they can hold themselves and its members to a higher standard if they want (they are a privatly, not state-run entity). MLB outlawed anabolic steroids in 1988. Andro and all the other substances they were using were known to be just different versions of the same thing... "performance enhancing drugs". As MLB sees it, just because they weren't aware of the substance in the time to ban it immediately, that doesn't mean the players didn't know what they were doing and why they were taking it. It's not a court of law, we don't have to play stupid and pretend they really believed that they were just taking those substances and gaining 50 lbs of muscle from a simple "nutritional supplement". That's idiotic. You can try and play the Donald Trump "but technically it's legal, right?" game but it just exposes you to be ethically compromised or at the least hypocritical.

Technically Sosa never held the record as when he hit #66, that days games were still in progress. He would have only held the record if McGwire went homerless that night, which as we know he also hit #66......then 67 and 68 on Saturday and 69 and 70 on Sunday.

@@stevewilliams1176 Not sure what you mean by "technically." I don't think MLB would recognize that as his record even if it took McGuire until the next day to beat it. It is the single season home run record. I doubt they would count it if someone only held the record for part of the season. Though it has never come up that I know of to count a single season record holder for just part of a season. If they were to count that, I see no reason why holding it for a day would be any different than holding it for 45 minutes. Is there some rule I'm not aware of?

@@Sam_on_RU-vid McGwire hit his 66th the same night Sosa hit his. So they both finished that days schedules games tied with 66. My point his that Sosa was not officially recognized as the single season HR record holder when he hit his 66th because games were still in progress around the league, including St. Louis.

Sammy bleached his skin and white now.

​@@jennyanydots2389he went from "Off the Wall" to "This Is It" in a pretty short span.

Did them beetings handed down by yo daddy make it any less amazing son?

Yep, watched this game and had a McGwire poster in my room later on even though I was never a Cards fan.

OMG WTF you like, 93 YO or something boiiiii!?!?!?!??!?!? Totes prolly gots them gross balls in adult diapers thing goin on son!!

yea u supported a drugie and a cheater.

My memories of it are ruined giiven what we know now though. frauds.

@@Iridescence93 Get over it

@@stevewilliams1176 It's not something I think about a lot. I just don't care about cheaters. Congrats to Judge, Aaron and Maris who did it the right way. Bonds, McGwire and Sosa don't deserve to be celebrated IMO

@@Iridescence93 Bonds, McGwire, and Sosa have paid a price for what they did by forfeiting the HOF. I don't feel any different about 1998 now than I did then. It's still the greatest summer of baseball in my lifetime to date (I'm now 52) and I'd rather relive Mac HR's on RU-vid than watch the product MLB has going right now. So agree to disagree.

Are you sure it wasn't cuz yo daddy was beetin yo ass on the regular as a boy son?

Yeah it did

You're a races then I see

I loved it !!! I bought so much damm Mcqwire merchandise… (now worthless) but was fun and incredible to watch at every bar ,house party , club !!!

Lol

Yeah, lost in all of this was the Cubs returning to the playoffs for the first time since 1989. A stretch where the team had just two seasons with a winning record; saw the team lose its best pitcher in a decade to free agency (Greg Maddux); and lose it's best overall player of the 80's to a combo of a messy divorce and age finally catching up (Ryne Sandberg). That season was not supposed to be much different, with an aging roster and question marks all over the field. But, they scratched and clawed their way to a one game, win-and-your-in game with San Fransisco, and made it back to the postseason. I didn't even get too down about them being swept by Atlanta. The Braves were a juggernaut and the upstart Cubs weren't supposed to even be there. But, that season and that team, led by Sammy and rookie Kerry Wood, gave me hope for the future. Something I had not had in a long while, as a fan.

yea except sosa was a druggy and a cheater lol. moron.

Shohei ohtani will do that for a sport. He's the reason the game came back 100%. Finally there's a superstar doing something that steroids could never allow him to do. Otani could be taking all the steroids in the world, and it would not allow him to pitch and hit as well as he's doing right now.

Nobody hit bombs like Big Mac.. Dude was hitting missiles

Rip Calken

Got beat by McGuire the true king

@@mr.intamin1081True king? McGwire couldn’t hold Bonds’ jock.

@@mr.intamin1081 😂😂😂😂😂….. it was on hell of a summer…. 98’

@@andrewalden8364 In terms of hitting HR's, McGwire is the king. Highest HR/AB ratio of all time....a full at bat better than Babe Ruth. Mac hit 583 HR's in just over 6,100 at bats. Bonds had over 9,800 at bats. Taking McGwire's HR/AB ratio of 10.6 over the same total number of at bats as Bonds and it comes to 928 career HR's. In terms of overall player, that's not even worth debating as Bonds was a 5 tool guy and McGwire was a HR specialist....but that's the subject here: HR's. Longevity (and consistency) was the key to Bonds' HR total of 762. He played 22 seasons compared to 16 for McGwire.

Gwynn was chasing 3,000 hits (which he reached in 1999), not any HR record as he was not a HR hitter.

@@stevewilliams1176 that makes more sense, thanks. I wasn’t tuned in as an infant that year lol

He wasn't natural son. Don't kid urself boy.

@@jennyanydots2389 Besmirching KG's legacy is unamerican, child.

@@wakkawakkagaming3710 The amount of Stacker 3's Kenny G Jay was throwin down in the locker rooms back in the day was un'merican boy!! Pretty sure he smokes a fair amount of crack too.

son@@wakkawakkagaming3710

@@jennyanydots2389 one of you two is certainly on crack

Fran Tarkenton would be another good one for Untitled if they don't already have one

@@dominicpancella3012 i don’t think they do.

@@MichaelMiller-wn8yh The supplements discussion was rapidly and completely overshadowed by the prevailing narrative - as exemplified by Shank's column - until the season ended.

No way!!! 😂😂😂

I remember in high school, I had a teacher who is a die-hard Cubs fan and HATES the Yankees. When he gave us something to read in class, it actually was related to what we were learning in class, not just to tease us Yankee fans, steroids got mentioned when it came to the Yankees so one classmate said oh and Sammy Sosa. Then another said and he corked his bat and I said and he turned white. 🤣 He laughed it off though and said I don't care what you have to say.

He was trash in 98 thats why. nobody cares about barry bonds hes a joke. Look at his rookie season and then last season. fing cheater, get the f out of here and it didnt really matter when he did it because it had already been done.

In fact, Bonds is the only member of the 500-500 club. He was actually 2nd among all active MLB players in career stolen bases at the time of his blackballing, er, retirement.

Yeah, the first decade or so of Bonds' career was really special. Unfortunately it's the latter half that gives a lot of people pause. Whereas McGwire and Sosa were using supplements that MLB hadn't banned, several years later Bonds juiced during and after the steroid crackdown. And whereas the pair in '98 were by and large friendly to each other and to the media, Bonds always seemed to have a bone to pick with somebody. Not to say that Bonds in his 30s wasn't an extraordinarily talented player, but his inflated stats come from a much more negative position than those accrued by McGwire, Sosa, or any of the other guys who were experimenting chemically in the late '90s.

@@dominicpancella3012 I agree with everything you said, but I still don't think the BBWA should use that as just cause to not let him in Cooperstown, especially when you consider the fact that Cap Anson and Ty Cobb are still there

@@arizonawrestlinginterviews1040why what did Cobb do

Aside from Ripken and Randy... those accomplishments are all tainted 😞

​@taco_fall_out___boy everything is tainted Ruth benefitted from segregation, wonky stadiums and logs as bats. Hank Aaron had greenies, Rickey had cocaine, judge had juiced balls.

Yes! I've mentioned this before, as well. This season brought the sport back.

Turns out he'd been beetin his dawgs teeth out they mouf every few months when the roid rage and the media came to be too much fo his dumb ass to handle proper and right. Sammy was goin through like 39 dawgs per years during those peak years son... so many roids, so much dissapointment, dude just couldn't take it when he went home at night... took it all out on them dawgs boy. Imagine peak roid rage Sammy just beetin a dawg to death with his bear hands.... Slammin Sammy could prolly take out like 3 or 4 dawgs at a time if he wanted to back then. He prolly can't even take on more than one of them dawgs these days.

Sammy "Samosa" Sosa

People thought he came outta nowhere. But, Cubs fans knew he had potential. Sammy was the first Cub to make the 30-30 club, before the power surge began and he stopped swiping bags. Back then, he was also known to have a cannon of an arm- despite taking some adventurous paths to the ball. He was a raw talent, but their was a LOT of talent there.

@@rolmodel12.yea he was a cheater. no wonder he got good numbers.

As much as I would LOVE a football (soccer) video, I wouldn’t hold my breath for SB to upload another one for awhile. With them being American, footy videos are pretty rare to come by from them… But I will add a suggestion/request to make this a list… Beef History: Mauro Icardi v Maxi Lopez

Womanchester Divided