Judge, Maris and the old Yankee ghosts

His story, more than curious and particular, also has a tone of tragedy. Twice Most Valuable Player of the American League, his own fans turned against him for the only “sin” of messing with the Yankees’ ghosts. Yes, because absolutely no one, but no one wanted Maris to leave behind a home run mark set by the legendary Babe Ruth 34 years earlier.

Besides, if he did break it, people (including reporters and MLB executives) preferred that his teammate and eventual Hall of Famer, the spectacular ambidextrous Micky Mantle, do it. Trained in ‘the house’, Mantle inherited the idol tag vacated by Joe DiMaggio. He was the ideal ‘image’, but an injury sidelined him, giving way for Maris to make history at the end of the 1961 season.

But not before receiving threats, losing his hair and even being booed at every stadium he visited. This is the story of Maris, the owner of the mark the judge wants to break.

From the ghost of Ruth to the McGwire-Sosa-Bonds “trap.”
When the Yankees face the Tampa Bay Rays this Saturday, Judge will be 55 home runs away from tying and seven away from surpassing Maris’ mark.

Judge reached 55 home runs in his first 136 games, the third-fastest in MLB history. Only Sammy Sosa, with 58 (1999), and Barry Bonds, with 57 (2001), recorded more in that number of games. In fact, it is the ninth time in American League history that a player has hit at least 55 home runs.

Judge, likewise, seeks to be third in the American League with at least 60 home runs, the first since Maris in 1961. Before him, Ruth reached 60 in 1927.

The funny thing about Maris, and also Mantle, is that while they were chasing the record (then the overall mark for home runs in all of Major League Baseball), commissioner Ford Frick ruled that for the mark to be “valid,” it would have to be in 154 games, just as Ruth did.

That was the first season in the American League with the 162-game stretch, the one we know today. If either of the two (Mantle had not yet been injured) broke the mark outside that period, the record would have an asterisk. And so it was.

Mantle fell by the wayside after initially suffering from a respiratory infection when the team’s announcer recommended that he visit a special doctor – Max Jacobson, aka “Dr. Feelgood.”

Jacobson was known among celebrities and politicians as a doctor who administered injections of amphetamines mixed with vitamins and human placenta, among other things, that would ‘cure’ you overnight.

The injection, according to Mantle’s biography, went wrong. He was hospitalized with fever and infection. The wound opened about two inches above the hip bone. End of season for Mantle, who returned briefly for the World Series. He was left with 54 home runs.

This opened the door for Maris to stay in the race. When the famous 154th game arrived, the date the commissioner had set, Maris did not go over 59.

Still, he had several games left to break the mark. He tied Ruth’s record at home against Baltimore against pitcher Jake Fisher. Then on October 1, 1961, in the final game of the regular season, Maris connected for 61 against Boston Red Sox rookie pitcher Tracy Stallard. The ball was caught in the stands by a young truck driver, Sal Durante.

Stadium security told the boy that Maris wanted the ball, to give it to him. The young man, then 19, agreed. But only on one condition: he had to give it to Maris personally and meet him.

When he did so, at the end of the meeting, Maris signed the ball. But he didn’t keep it; on the contrary, he confessed to the boy that he’d rather he kept it. “That he was going to get a lot of money out of it.”

That right there, beyond winning the World Series at the end of the year, or breaking the myth of Ruth’s ghost (or even enduring cries that Mantle was better than him) was his best legacy that year. A clear demonstration of his class as a person who, despite suffering countless situations that affected him for the rest of his career, never thought selfishly. Always as a team.

Maris was never the same. The next year, he hit 33 home runs, then 23, then 26. And in his last four seasons, he combined for only 35 home runs total, his last two with the St. Louis Cardinals.

In 1991, a panel officially removed the asterisk from Maris’ mark. He didn’t live to see it, as he passed away a lustrum earlier at age 51.

The single-season home run mark stood until 1998, when Mark McGwire broke the record in St. Louis, with the Maris family in attendance. He finished the season with 70 homers to Sammy Sosa’s 66. That was one of the best battles for a MVP in the National League and the league in general. Some say that this direct McGwire-Sosa duel made fans fall in love again and attracted them to the game. In 2001, Barry Bonds connected for 73, all of them involved in the steroid era.

Which begs the question: is Maris still the true ‘king’ of home runs in a season?

Another debate for another day. In the meantime, Judge is chasing history. Of course, in a much different context than when Maris did. As of today, all of New York is cheering for their ‘Judge’ to break such a mark.

Something that would help him in his MVP debate against a phenomenon never seen before, a certain Shohei Ohtani. Someone who is also not indifferent to Ruth, the older phantom.