Home Runs Down

The Elias Sports Bureau reported this week that home runs are down this year and at their lowest level since 2002. Through Sunday May 8th, there have been 1.97 HR per game in Major League Baseball. Last year, there were 2.16 through the same number of games.

Most people draw the conclusion that this is because of baseball's new steroid testing policy and penalties, and that might have something to do with it, but while the drop from last year to this year is significant, I'm not convinced that five weeks is a long enough time to draw a conclusion.

As an aside, the owners this week endorsed Bud Selig's tougher proposed penalties for steroid use, which are 50 games for a first offense, 100 for a second and a lifetime ban for a third.

At this time of year, there are too many other factors that can be considered. Most prominent among those is the weather. I don't know how it's been in other places, but it's been pretty cold here in Chicago this spring.

We also have some of the big boppers dealing with injuries. The biggest of those, of course, is Barry Bonds, who has yet to play this year. Lance Berkman has played in only a handful of games after starting the year on the DL. Both Jim Thome and Sammy Sosa have been dealing with injuries and are currently on the DL. Moises Alou has also had a DL stint in April and Scott Rolen just went on this week.

It could also be that pitching is a little ahead of the hitting too. Not only are home runs down, but so is overall run production and batting averages.

So let's wait and look at it again after the season, when all the outside factors have had a chance to normalize.

By the way, 2002 was the year after Bonds hit 73 and Sosa hit 64. In 2002, Alex Rodriguez hit 57 and Jim Thome hit 52. Nobody has hit 50 since.

In May of 2002, when stories like this were being written, the theories centered on a change in the ball, which MLB denied. The HR totals in 2002 never caught up to 2001. In 2001, there were 5455 home runs in MLB vs only 5059 in 2002.

We'll see what happens this year.