Anyone heard of the book "The Year Babe Ruth Hit 104 Home Runs" by Bill Jenkinson?

I haven't read it, but heard about it and it sounds like it brings up a lot of mitigating factors worthy of consideration, it is based on 28 YEARS of research!

For one, it looked into Ruth's 1921 season and concludes that Ruth's same hits that season would have accounted for over 100 home-runs in today's ballparks under today's rules.

Essentially tries to argue that Ruth is still the greatest slugger of all-time.

It just seems like worthy reading for anyone interested in discussions such as this.

I live in Minnesota and, even though our TiVO was probably at least 10 minutes behind, I am to blame for the loss of Scott Baker's perfect game. When the 9th inning started, I moved off the cushy chair that I had sat on for one or two other innings, down to the floor about 4 feet in front of the TV, a floor with more than a little dog hair and I think even some dog slobber on it.

Needless to say Baker broke down. His first pitch of the inning should have been called a strike, but was called a ball. This rattled Baker and he proceeded to lose the perfect game.

Experienced Twins' fan that I am, I knew it was trouble when Mike Sweeney showed up in the on-deck circle. He hadn't even had an at-bat in over 2 months! If I had only stayed in that cushy-chair, Sweeney would've stayed on that hard blue visitors' bench, Baker would've gotten the next two outs, and the Twins would've had their first no-hitter of this decade.

Of course I'm sure all would've been fine if a certain pesky sportswriter hadn't mentioned no-hitters in his column today.

It might have turned out to be a dud. But then, what, Michigan vs. Appalachian State -- that's this Saturday at noon EDT -- was a surefire humdinger?

King! You're aaaaaallll right!

I disagree with a previous poster who claimed there is no parity in baseball. MLB has 30 teams, and 11 different teams have made it to the World Series in this decade (out of 14 possible). Only two teams (Yankees and Cardinals) have made it more than once.

I think only like 6 or 7 of the 30 have failed to make the playoffs this decade.

Come on, Salon, you don't need to look that far.

King, do you think football is due for a steroids brouhaha similar to that being experienced by baseball?

Furthermore, do you think the NFL is owned by the gamblers? My brother has propogated this theory, no more than 25% joking at any time, I think. He specifically called out the Cowboys as throwing games last season. It's not really teams, though, just specific players and referees.

I mostly just laughed when he would say such things, then Tony Romo miffed that chip-shot field-goal snap against the Seahawks. Now I wonder.

...and I was there!! I know it's not nearly as high on the national sports radar screen as it is on my personal sports radar screen right now, and I know King doesn't dig the NHL "regular" season, but it was really frickin' cool!! I felt it deserved acknowledgement in King's column. Even if just the letters section.

How about, within the last two minutes or so, say that if you foul a team, not only do they get foul shots, but they get automatic possession of the ball after the foul shots? That takes away the incentive to foul big-time. And it's simple.

Without fouls, I imagine the game could get much more rough. And the shot clock being 10 seconds just sounds weird.

Regarding LW's assertion that "You've turned your back on some of the wonderful things that made your country great and embraced some extremely ugly things -- imperialism, resource wars, torture, etc."... I would just like to say- have you read any history? Please tell me of ANY period of time from 1776 to the present day when America was NOT doing this?

From slavery, to the slaughter of the Native Americans, to suppression of minority rights after the Civil War, to suppressing popular uprisings and supporting brutal, dictatorial regimes in Latin America all through the 20th century, to being the only country to drop an atomic bomb (on a civilian populace, no less), to the rape of the lands of Southeast Asia, to arming Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden in the 1980's...

Hey, I LOVE baseball, I patronize fast food restaurants, I think San Francisco, New York, Chicago, and the Twin Cities are beautiful, I love our national parks, I cherish a good day-long romp down the Interstate (unaffordable though it now is)... and I am grateful that some of the violence we've helped perpetrate in far off lands has never been foisted upon my own hometown (unless we want to start discussing the rampant violence easily found nightly on the news), but who would I be if I pretended America's best qualities were enough to compensate for the above-mentioned brutalities and qualify my country as great?

My starting advice to the LW would be first, distributor of information that you are, review some historical information, consider what an ally your own country has been in many of these affairs, or how your own country's history mirrors ours, and then start asking yourself- what are YOU going to do about it? Your history-reading should also tell you: the masses are never granted the rights they want by a benevolent, powerful few. The rights must be demanded, and the best way has always been through committed, civil/non-violent, and massively organized, democratic ACTION! (Sound familiar? See Cary's previous column)