Abreu Shatters Home Run Derby Record

Major League Baseball is taking a breather this week. A little more than halfway through its 162-game season, the best of the best play the All-Star Game, and everybody else gets three days off to recover and try to remember the names of the wife and kids. Baseball has discovered, though, that giving up three-days of TV ratings and revenues isn’t such a hot deal, so they have created some extra events to make up for it. The Home Run Derby is perhaps the best of these, and Bobby Abreu stole the show Monday night.

The concept is simple enough. Any ball hit out of the park counts as a point, and ball that doesn’t is an out. Each player is allowed 10 outs, and if he doesn’t swing, the pitch is ignored. Eight men started, with the top four advancing to a second round, and the top two out of that going head to head for the title. Points from previous rounds don’t count.

The ballpark (named “Comerica park” named for that baseball legend, Comerica Bank which paid to put its name on the stadium) in Detroit is not known as a home-run hitter’s field. It’s 345 feet to the left field foul pole, 335 to right, and a huge 420 to straightaway center. The record for most runs in a round was 15, set by Miguel Tejada in Houston last year. Mr. Abreu shattered it as the lead-off man in the first round with 24. He managed to get through the second round (had he over-done it and run out of steam?) with 6, finishing second to home town favorite Ivan Rodriguez who scored 8. The final round went to Mr. Abreu 11-5.

There is no feat in sports quite like a home run. They happen just rarely enough to be exciting, and often enough that fans have a fair shot at seeing one on any given day. It is a combination of strength, timing and on occasion luck (for example the wind direction at Wrigley Field makes all the difference). Monday night was a veritable feast for the long-ball addicts.

In an interesting twist, Century 21 realtors added a twist to the event. When any player had 9 outs, a “golden ball” was pitched. Any golden ball hit for a home run resulted in $21,000 to charity from the company. Before Mr. Abreu walked off the field around $300,000 had been earned. The occasion re-introduced one of the things that sometimes slips out of professional sports. It was fun.


© Copyright 2005 by The Kensington Review, J. Myhre, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent.
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