Let me begin by saying that I’m going to address two topics that we’re all more than a little bit sick of at this point: Steroids and the Torre book.  I know, I know. But you can relax.  It’s not what you think.

I got a chance to start The Yankee Years, but I’m not going to comment on Torre or A-Fraud or any of that.  I will reserve judgment on the more tawdry aspects of the book until I’ve finished it.   But I do want to share something that struck me as I was reading.

In 1998, the Yankees’ blowout season, the season they won 114 games, the one we look back on all starry-eyed and wistfully, no one on the Yankees hit more than 28 home runs.  That’s right.  No one.  But they did manage to lead the league in runs.  And walks.  Yeah, I know.  Walks.  Pretty boring.  Especially back then-before every walk at the Stadium was sponsored by Johnnie Walker.  (You stay classy, New York Yankees.)

I point this out merely because this was the same year that people were going loco over Sosa and McJuicer.  The year that they were battling it out for the home run record, and in so doing, supposedly “saving baseball.”

Super heroes for the new millennium.

But at the end of the day, Sosa and the Cubs got eliminated in a three game sweep in the DS.  McJuicer’s Cards didn’t even make it to the playoffs.  Not even close.  There can be no doubt that getting juiced and going for long balls can do quite a bit to boost a player’s personal stats and gives the fans a little something to get worked up about.  But it doesn’t necessarily make for a winning team, or good baseball for that matter.

Hell, remember the Giants back when Bonds was trying to break Aaron’s career home run record?  Watching that team was about as fun as watching paint dry.  But without the benefit of knowing that you were going to end up with something freshly painted at the end of the game.

We may get a certain sense of instant gratification from the big hits. A sacrifice bunt or an RBI single don’t give us quite that same surge.  But, when combined, the payoff is often greater.  It’s just that it comes a little later on. In October.

And at that point, I think that most of us agree that it’s always well worth the wait.