All the Babe's Men—Baseball's Greatest Home Run Seasons and How They Changed America

Why are Americans obsessed with the home run in sports, business, and even life?What made the steroid era inevitable? Revisiting the great home run seasons of BabeRuth through that of Barry Bonds, "All the Babe s Men" answers these and other provocativequestions.Baseball evolved in a Darwinian study of fate, accident, necessity, and occasional subterfuge.Babe Ruth clubbed his record sixty homers with a heavier bat than what contemporarysluggers like Sammy Sosa used. Ruth batted low in the lineup, swung freely, and knockedballs over the fences. Other players noticed, like Rogers Hornsby, whose own home runtotals went from nine in 1919 to forty-two in 1922. But bat speed has become more importantin today s game. Big league stadiums built in urban areas have compressed the field andsport shorter outfields compared to the vast meadows where the game was born. Theplayers, owners, and fans became hooked, but our addiction took us to excess."All the Babe s Men" features the game s special long ball seasons from Ruth to Bonds anddivulges how baseball became king, America evolved into a home run society, and thecontemporary game found itself trapped in a legal nightmare.