As Alex Rodriguez did a tidy little tap dance around tough steroid use questions on Tuesday in Tampa, Ryan Howard was fielding ground balls and taking batting practice in Clearwater, Fla.
Just a few months have passed since Howard, a St. Louis area native, helped the Philadelphia Phillies win the World Series for the first time since 1980.
And just a week has passed since the 29-year-old slugger signed a three-year, $54-million deal with the Phils that puts him among the Major League’s highest paid players.
The smile that often graces his face hasn’t changed, but the body that carried him to Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player Awards in the first two seasons of his career has changed.
Gone are 20 pounds, leaving Ryan at 250.
“I definitely feel better,” he told reporters last week after arriving at Phillies spring training camp early.
“Endurance is a lot better. Everything, the whole body feels better.”
Ryan said his plan was to lose 10 pounds and “see how I felt,” then lose another 10.
He feels great after losing the girth, but I wonder if he is prepared to now shoulder the weight of all Major League Baseball?
You see, MLB needs Howard to “save the game.” Just as the disgraced Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds were once credited with doing, Howard is in a position to sweeten a very sour fan base.
All it takes is 62 home runs. And he can do it, folks, believe me.
Now that A-Rod is out of the “save the game” picture, thanks to his steroid use, the pressure is squarely on the youthful Howard.
The baseball gods need Rodriguez to top Bonds’ all time home run record. In fact, worthless Commissioner Bud Selig and MLB wanted A-Rod to blast 800 home runs to officially end all discussion about steroids and home runs.
Oops.
A-Rod is out. Ryan Howard is in.
None of us knows if Howard has something in his system that cannot be detected, but it’s not steroids and, for now, that’s good enough for MLB. My buddy Mike Terhaar, who lays out our award-winning sports pages, never lets me praise Howard without mentioning HGH. That’s fair, thanks to the constant lies by players, owners, the players’ association and Selig when it comes to performance-enhancing drugs.
But I really think he’s clean. So, he’s the one that can again get baseball fans talking about the baseball – not the drug use.
In 2006, Howard hit 58 home runs. He was on pace to top 61, but wilted in late September. The weight probably had something to do with this. He hit 47 homers in 2007 and 2008 last year, when he finished second in MVP balloting to Albert Pujols.
In both 2007 and ’08, Ryan struck out an alarming 199 times.
If Howard can find a way to strike out less, the home run numbers should go up. If he had found four more home runs in 2006, he would now be recognized as “the real single-season home run king.”
But now he has a real chance to win that recognition. All baseball fans want to forget that McGwire, Sosa and Bonds sailed past Roger Maris’ record mark of 61 home runs in 1961. What better candidate than Howard?
The Howard bashers, many of who are St. Louis sports media members, would certainly change their tune if he socked 62.
Selig would actually show up at games as Ryan approached the magic number.
Kids would again have a home run hero to look up to.
Hopefully, he doesn’t get hurt. Hopefully, he doesn’t crack under the pressure if he indeed approaches the single-season home run record.
And hopefully, that 20 pounds lost will lead to less strikeouts and 20 more home runs in 2009.
And we will then call Ryan “the real home run king.”
