Home Run Fever

You can the in the dinger wringer. This occurs to you an hour north of San Diego, after your second Coca-Cola's gone and the rumble of the lane dividers has just snapped your eyes open for the third time and your body realizes it's gone 24 hours without sleep. You roll down the windows, crank up the radio, scream with The Who and Jethro Tull at the top of your lungs for the next 45 minutes—that's how you reel into L.A. International and live to see Griffey swing his black bat.

Only nine of your kind surround Junior when he looks up, stick of red licorice poking out of his mouth, eyes cool, voice distant. You can touch the tension again, glimpse the cliff edge these three sluggers must walk. If they play along with your questions, if they ignore teammates' glances in a clubhouse where code dictates that no player steps above the other 24, if they reveal their deepest cravings for immortality, they're inviting free fall and ridicule from within and without should they fall short of 61. If they don't play along, if they ask to be left alone when they hear the same question for the 23rd straight day, or if they give the Dogpatch Gazette reporter's question the glare and bark it deserves, they risk ruining their reputation forever even as they lay claim to the most acclaimed individual sports record in America. How's Junior going to play this game before the game?

"I don't like to talk about myself," he says. "Hard to believe, isn't it? I'm not going to talk about home runs. I just want to win. I'm not going to talk about McGwire and Sosa. They don't help this team win. It's hard for people to believe that Roger Maris's record isn't important to me, but it's not." Nine of you clutch empty notepads, all your questions about McGwire, Sosa, Maris, home runs and Griffey himself just blown away in the top of the first, so now what do you do? Play cat and mouse, of course, ask Junior 20 questions about why he won't talk about McGwire, Sosa, Maris, home runs or himself. In no time Junior's sitting on an equipment chest, feet propped up, grinning and spinning the nine of you wherever he wants, in no hurry at all to leave. He's the cat, you're the mice, and as long as that's clear, he's enjoying the attention—for now.

A journalist uses the word chase. Junior won't have it. "Only thing I wanna chase is my kids," he says. Nobody's going to pigeonhole him as a home run hitter when he's clearly the finest all-around player in the game. Nobody's going to make him pant after a goal that 270 million others have set for him.

"That's all people want to talk about," he says, "but 50 home runs will probably win you only 12 games a season. I think more about the little things, like playing defense, getting guys over—that might win you 40 games. I think about wanting to be the last guy on the field at the end of the season, spraying free champagne all over my teammates. I just wasn't brought up to talk about myself. Growing up, my dad [former Cincinnati Reds star Ken Griffey] would probably bop me on the head if I bragged. He's got three rings, and I want a couple for myself. If someone doesn't like me because I don't want to talk about myself or home runs, that's their problem."

Strikes you as odd, then, Junior's answer to one of the last questions: Which of the Reds, whose clubhouse he rattled around in as a boy, impressed him most as a player? "George Foster," he says.

"That surprises me," says the questioner, obviously expecting Junior to say Pete Rose, Joe Morgan or Johnny Bench. "Why Foster?"

"Fifty-two home runs," Junior replies.

"But with all their great players...."

"None of the others hit 52 home runs in a season," says Junior.