we already list records by "modern" (post 1900) when we feel like it. Do you include Spalding among greatest W-L pct? Pud Galvin with more wins than Spahn? Is Anson 3rd in RBI behind only Aaron and Ruth? And my favorite, Jim Devlin 3rd all-time in ERA (despite leading his league in most losses for the majority of his career!). All depends on the record book chosen at the moment.

Just use the Santa Claus approach. Make Barry Bonds the all-time "Naughty" champion. Aaron is "Nice."

Terence Moore: Journalist*

*alleged

Exactly!

The numbers as they happened:

Home Runs Record - single season

154 game season: Babe Ruth 60
162 game season: Roger Maris 61

Actually, since you mentioned it, why not list records by pre- and post-segregation? It's an interesting teaching tool and suggests the game changed dramatically as a result.


Because why stop there? You could go on and on. Do you really think every record in the books needs to look like this?

154 game record, deadball era: 29 - Babe Ruth, 1919
154 game record, live ball, pre-integration: 60 - Babe Ruth, 1927
154 game record, post integration: 54 - Ralph Kiner, 1949
162 game record, pre DH: 61 - Roger Maris, 1961
162 game record, post DH: 73 - Barry Bonds, 2001
162 game record, post DH, no proof of roids: 66 - Sammy Sosa, 1998
162 game record, post DH, no suspicions of roids: 58 - Ryan Howard 2006

And I'm sure someone could come up with a lot of other distinctions too. For every single record. Seems like a collassal (spelling?) waste of space to me.

Why not? That's actually a fascinating list you've got there. I'm not being facetious, either. It tells us a great deal about the game.

Why not? That's actually a fascinating list you've got there. I'm not being facetious, either. It tells us a great deal about the game.

Cuz it just takes up too much space in the books if they listed every record like this. And I honestly don't think the casual fan that just wants to find out who holds a few simple records would be interested in all that.

I love learning about the history of the game and why records are what they are too, but that's something people can research on their own if they're interested. IMHO, record books just need to list numbers, not educate people on the history behind them. There are other books for that.

Actually, since you mentioned it, why not list records by pre- and post-segregation? It's an interesting teaching tool and suggests the game changed dramatically as a result.

If integration hadn't happened so gradually we could do that.

Actually, since you mentioned it, why not list records by pre- and post-segregation? It's an interesting teaching tool and suggests the game changed dramatically as a result.

If integration hadn't happened so gradually we could do that.

Agreed. I certainly don't think of the late 40's as being "integrated" just because there were a few black players. Seems to me that the NL wasn't really fully integrated until the 50's and the AL wasn't until the 60's.

Actually, since you mentioned it, why not list records by pre- and post-segregation? It's an interesting teaching tool and suggests the game changed dramatically as a result.

If integration hadn't happened so gradually we could do that.

Agreed. I certainly don't think of the late 40's as being "integrated" just because there were a few black players. Seems to me that the NL wasn't really fully integrated until the 50's and the AL wasn't until the 60's.

And besides, "integration" exists on an ever-changing continuum. If I had to pick a point at which to say it had really occurred, it would've been when all the teams in the Majors began to compete for Latin American talent. That took a lot longer than it took all the teams to go after African Americans.

Even now, we still haven't reached the point where the best available talent around the world is playing in one North American league, and we probably never will. But we're a lot closer to that Platonic ideal than we were in 1960 or even 1980.

Then... don't list integration. I don't see record books as sacred, and I don't see record books as necessarily having to cater to the superficial fan.

I'm a hardliner when it comes to season length. The details elude me but I can remember as a kid being outraged after the NFL season went to 14 games and so and so was touted as having broken Jim Brown's (?) single season rushing record. Something like an additional 74 yards in two extra games. And for that cheap beat Jim Freaking Brown disappears from the record books? No way. It's just wrong.

The problem is that so many of these writers claim to be outraged at the impact to the history of the game but then they do such a horrible job of knowing it and educating us on it. Just because a record is broken doesn't mean the player who previously held the record should be forgotten about. To the contrary, if Terence Moore is worried about Hank Aaron's legacy he can serve that legacy by writing at length about Aaron the player and Aaron the person.

To elevate Aaron it is not necessary to bring down Bonds, Hank Aaron's legacy can stand quite nicely on its own.

I use Aaron as an example but this is true of so many. Instead of complaining that "Steroid Junkie X" has passed Mickey Mantle's HR total a writer should simply take the opportunity to write about Mantle. "Hey, John Smith just hit his 537th home run. This reminds me of a great player of my youth, Mickey Mantle. Here is why I loved and still love Mickey Mantle."

The details elude me but I can remember as a kid being outraged after the NFL season went to 14 games and so and so was touted as having broken Jim Brown's (?) single season rushing record. Something like an additional 74 yards in two extra games. And for that cheap beat Jim Freaking Brown disappears from the record books? No way. It's just wrong.

See, this is the exact reason why I think a lot sportwriters do call for asterisks and separate records and all that - because they want their favorite players to keep their records forever and they want to believe that no one who comes later could possibly match up to their boyhood hero's. If it's not season length, it's the DH. If it's not the DH, it's steroids. There's always going to be a reason (excuse?) for someone to discredit modern records. Just like there's always going to be a reason for new fans of the modern game to shrug off the achievements of their parents generation. I really do think for most people it has more to do with preserving childhood memories than it does about being "fair."

I liked McGwire way more than I did Bonds and I didn't want his record to be broken, especially so soon. But it happened and I'm not going to try to think of reasons why the new record shouldn't count just because I didn't like it. Records are what they are.

Luckily, no one has forgotten Jim Brown or Babe Ruth just because some of their most famous records have been surpassed. :)

See, this is the exact reason why I think a lot sportwriters do call for asterisks and separate records and all that - because they want their favorite players to keep their records forever and they want to believe that no one who comes later could possibly match up to their boyhood hero's. If it's not season length, it's the DH. If it's not the DH, it's steroids. There's always going to be a reason (excuse?) for someone to discredit modern records. Just like there's always going to be a reason for new fans of the modern game to shrug off the achievements of their parents generation. I really do think for most people it has more to do with preserving childhood memories than it does about being "fair."

Hey, nice mindreading! As for the "validity" of your argument (the most specious I've seen since Nieporent last showed up), I have no idea why you can't live with legitimate records side by side, but obviously, for reasons you won't own up to, you can't deal with it. Too bad.

Seriously, the idea of listing records for seasons of different lengths upsets you this much? WTF?

I mean, for all the smoke you're blowing about steroids, you still, underneath it all, realize that if you end up lengthening the NFL season by 50%, and "break" a record by a couple of yards, you really haven't broken it, right? I'm pretty sure you grasp that. And once you do, you have to admit it makes sense to have distinct listings. Unless you want to go back to making up silliness about steroids and fantasize about motives, that is.

No love for Joe Bauman?

Hey, nice mindreading!

I didn't have to try and read your mind - you flat out said that you remembered being a kid and thinking it was wrong that Jim Brown's record was "broken" by someone playing a few extra games per season. I don't know if Jim Brown was your personal "boyhood hero" or not, but that example is basically the very definition of the boyhood hero argument I was making above.

Seriously, the idea of listing records for seasons of different lengths upsets you this much? WTF?

Dude, you sound much more angry about this issue than I do. It doesn't upset me. It's just unnecessary and the same logic could be used to create an infinite number of "records." Like I tried to imply above, why are separate records for different lengths of seasons any different than separate records for any number of other changes in the games history?

I mean, for all the smoke you're blowing about steroids

Um, what "smoke" have I been blowing about steroids in this thread or any other?

if you end up lengthening the NFL season by 50%, and "break" a record by a couple of yards, you really haven't broken it, right?

If the record is "most yards in a single NFL season", then yes, it has been broken. That doesn't mean in any way that the new record is better or more impressive, and I never said or implied that it was. It just means it's MORE.

If the record is "most yards in a single NFL season", then yes, it has been broken. That doesn't mean in any way that the new record is better or more impressive, and I never said or implied that it was. It just means it's MORE.

But by pretending the different season lengths don't exist, the record book is giving the appearance that it is better or more impressive.

Yes, you can take this too far (though, as noted above, the presentation of baseball records already does this with pre-original turn of the century marks, so that slippery slope has already been slud down). I just always thought season length was pretty damn meaningful when you're looking at single-season counting records.

Like I said above, I never saw what was the issue with acknowledging that some records are set through the use of a longer season. I would have seen little harm if prior to 1998, Roger Maris was considered the single-season and 162-game season home run record holder for homers, and Babe Ruth was the 154-game record holder; or if right now the record book showed Ichiro as the single-season/162-game record holder for hits, while George Sisler was identified as the 154-game record holder. It's just more information.

I just always thought season length was pretty damn meaningful when you're looking at single-season counting records.

It definitely is. I was just trying to point out that other things (segregation, especially) were very meaningful in shaping records too. I remember having a conversation with a Ruth fan (not on BTF) a few years back that was claiming that Aaron wouldn't have broken the Babe's record if he had played back in Ruth's day and didn't have the benefit of a 162 game season for the last 15 years of his career. I had to agree; Aaron surely WOULDN'T have broken the record back in Ruth's days. In fact, he wouldn't have hit ANY Major League homers cuz he wouldn't have been allowed to play. That sure seems like a more significant hit to the record books to me than an extra 8 games a season could ever be.

Like I said above, I never saw what was the issue with acknowledging that some records are set through the use of a longer season. I would have seen little harm if prior to 1998, Roger Maris was considered the single-season and 162-game season home run record holder for homers, and Babe Ruth was the 154-game record holder; or if right now the record book showed Ichiro as the single-season/162-game record holder for hits, while George Sisler was identified as the 154-game record holder. It's just more information.

"Harm" isn't the word I would use. Of course there's no harm in listing two records; just like there's no harm in only listing one. I personally don't think it's needed or that the average casual fan would really care about the extra information, but for those who do, the info is there for them to look up. It's just a matter of personal preference, really. Why the other poster assumed I found the mere suggestion infuriating or offensive is beyond me; I just don't find it necessary. I certainly wouldn't scribble out the 154 game record or anything if I bought a record book and it was listed.

Edit: fixed grammatical error

154 game season: Babe Ruth 60
162 game season: Roger Maris 61

The 1927 Yankees played 155 official games. The 1961 Yankees played 163.

As Maris said when Frick came up with his ridiculous asterisk, which 154 games? The first? The last? The middle?

Maris didn't hit his first HR of 1961 until the 11th game of the season, but as noted above the Yankees played 163 games that year so Roger hit his 61 in a span of 153 games. Ruth hit his first of 1927 in game four, but again, the Yankees played 155 games in 1927. So Ruth needed 152 games to hit 60. Also, Maris homered on the last day of the 1961 season, but Ruth hit his 60th on the next to last day of the 1927 season, so he picks up a game there. If you count games played instead of team games, Ruth edges a bit further ahead since he took four days off while Maris only skipped two of his team's games.

Terence Moore skews IQ decline.

Let the NFL argue which player or team was better "if only we had a laboratory" to create identical playing conditions, until then we TRULY won't know!! Boring.

I continue to point out greenie enhanced Hank Aaron's best HR season was age 37, a year older than a juiced up Bonds.

This is a silly discussion, of course. Structural factors in the 90s and 00s allowed hitters to hit home runs at a much greater rate -- this is a much larger factor than the 162 vs. 154 game season change in the home run "record". Fixating on the number of games is uninteresting. Now, if you want to list home run leaders by decade, that's fine with me. Heck, break it down by year, even!

I guess the really silly thing here is thinking that the home run "record" matters -- we're in the BBRef era, with HR factors, park factors, and all kinds of normalized statistics! I like to use the BBRef tool that neutralizes everything to the run scoring environment of the 2000 Colorado Rockies. Is it possible to make a leaderboard out of those stats? For instance, Barry Bonds would have hit 93 (!!) home runs instead of 73, McGwire had 85, Maris had 77, Ruth had 74...

Structural factors in the 90s and 00s allowed hitters to hit home runs at a much greater rate

you really can't be serious about going there are you? the fact is that pitchers didn't have the education on how to prevent homeruns in the 20's so it was MASSIVELY easier to hit homeruns if you are the only player in the game that took advantage of it.

I'm sorry but anybody who honestly thinks that any record prior to 1930 or so should be taken at gospel, is an uninformed moron. (which is precisely the point of this discussion)

What is the "right" number of home runs?

PureHomeRuns = HR - (HRs hit from 1996-2004) - (HRs hit as a DH) - (HRs hit off Eric Milton)

#51 And if we're going to count Spalding's NA totals I don't see any basis for not counting Pud Galvin as the record holder for single season wins. After all, I have no doubt he was playing against stronger competition than Spalding was. He went 72-25 in the IL and 10-5 in exhibitions against the NL. His 96 complete games (in the IL -- not sure how many of the exhibitions he completed) are pretty impressive too.