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Players worked out with weights—used supplements to do extensive weight training, like football players or weightlifters—and baseball became a hit or miss game.

The old-time baseball players didn’t look like defensive ends or weightlifters. In fact, they didn’t even lift weights. The best home run hitters of all time didn’t even weigh 200 pounds. Hank Aaron hit 755 home runs, mostly with his powerful wrists, and never struck out 100 times in a season. Ted Williams hit 521 home runs, and never struck out more than sixty-four times in any year. Mel Ott hit 511 homers, but never struck out seventy times in a season. Willie Mays had exactly one year that he struck out more than 100 times.

So, one reason the players hit more (and longer) home runs was that they built up their bodies with weightlifting and supplements and went up swinging for the fences. They were able to generate greater bat speed. Another reason was little fear or repercussions from strikeouts. The computer-generated statistics—and men like Bill James who were capable of analyzing the numbers—further advocated the end of bunting, sacrificing, and giving up outs to play for a single run.

I was not only a member of the media in 1996, but also a fan. I took my sons to baseball games, and wanted them to become fans, too. They wanted to see home runs. I wanted to see home runs. I remember telling people that the baseball season was twenty-six weeks long. For most of baseball history, a batter would be considered a home run threat if he hit one home run per week. Beginning in the mid-1990s, however, the best home run hitters were hitting two or three per week. It was like chocolate: a little was good, a lot was better. We fans ate up the home runs like chocolate, and were supersizing baseball.

Last five full seasons prior to work stoppage (1989-1993)

Players hitting 40+ homers in a season: 12

Players hitting 50+ homers in a season: 1 (Cecil Fielder 50 in 1990)

First five full seasons after work stoppage (1996-2000)

Players hitting 40+ homers in a season: 70

Players hitting 50+ homers in a season: 10

In 1998, four players hit 50+ homers, including Mark McGwire (seventy) and Sammy Sosa (sixty-six). McGwire hit sixty-five the next year, and Sosa hit sixty-three. Oh, and by the way, one player that had continued to play “old-time” baseball was the supremely talented Barry Bonds. Bonds always had low strikeout totals (only once, in his rookie season of 1986, had he struck out more than 100 times). Bonds, according to Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams’ book Game of Shadows, saw what was happening around him in 1996, 1997, and especially 1998, when McGwire and Sosa both broke the single-season home run mark. Even when McGwire was found with androstenedione (a stimulant that mimicked a steroid) in his locker, there were no real repercussions. Players were admitting to using creatine, which at the time was not a banned substance. McGwire admitted to “andro.” Was that a red herring? What else did he take, that wasn’t on display in his locker? Bonds didn’t like what he saw, which was less-talented players setting records and gaining admiration. It’s funny how everyone turned a blind eye when lower-level players became instantly muscular to make a roster. Although we saw the effects of those players, they got a pass from Baseball, from the media, and from the fans. Superstars who attacked records—like Bonds, beginning in 1998—became a victim of a witch hunt. Bonds became the symbol for steroid cheaters, somehow.

Was there a conspiracy to “see no evil” in baseball in the years prior to 2002, when baseball finally put rules against steroids in writing? My opinion is that there was, but there are reasons that many (including me) looked the other way.

The same rationalizations were given as when, in previous eras, players were tipped off by pitches, such as “they still had to hit the ball.” Yes, they still had to hit the ball. Plus, a certain number of pitchers were also juiced.