Maris put it more bluntly to Mantle himself: “I’m going nuts, Mick.” he said, according to the Orlando Sentinel. “The only time Roger can relax is during a ballgame,” Cerv told reporters. Yankees fans occasionally even booed Maris. "Not-so-jolly Roger," a sports writer called him afterward. In a span of 10 days that month, Maris criticized Yankees fans and an umpire and refused to meet with the media after a doubleheader in Detroit. But this is different, the questions day after day, the big story."
"Irritating," Maris described the attention he was receiving, according to Sports Illustrated. Just like that, the two-man race became a solo act, with all the pressure squarely on Maris, who was buckling under the weight of media demands for his time. Then Mantle developed an infection in his hip, forcing him to stop playing. But "The M&M Boys” shared a New York apartment with outfielder Bob Cerv, the Yankees' left fielder, and all got along well.īy mid-September, Maris led his teammates 56 home runs to 53. Maris and Mantle seemed to press to set the record in 154 games.īy August, a new storyline emerged, one that contrived an unfriendly competition between Maris and Mantle. Years later, Frick wrote that he never ordered an asterisk to be placed on the record-he had no such authority-but the media perceived he had. Frick was one of the few visitors allowed to see Ruth in the hospital before the Bambino died of cancer in 1948. He covered the Yankees and became friendly enough with Ruth to ghost write a 1928 book with him. Influential New York sports columnist Dick Young even suggested noting any new home run record with an asterisk.Ī former semipro baseball player, Frick had come to New York in the 1920s as a sportswriter. For the 1961 season, the American League expanded its schedule from 154 to 162 games after it went from eight to 10 teams. On July 17, MLB commissioner Ford Frick announced at a news conference that record keepers should have two separate categories for a season home run record-one for Ruth's, set during a 154-game season, and one for any record set in a 162-game season. MLB Commissioner Ford Frick and Asterisk Controversyīabe Ruth hit 60 home runs for the New York Yankees in 1927, setting a Major League Baseball record. Then the pressure really ratcheted up that sizzling summer. The double pursuit of Ruth was a preseason storyline, and the intensity of the chase built by the end of June, when Maris and Mantle were ahead of the Bambino's 1927 pace. Maris was the interloper, a 26-year-old Midwesterner whose years with the Kansas City Athletics and Cleveland Indians had not prepared the right fielder for New York's bright lights. “A wonderful player,” remembers Vescey, who went on to have a lengthy career as one of the New York Times’ top columnists. “The fans had finally taken to Mantle after booing his for five, six, seven years.” Mantle, a 29-year-old center fielder from Oklahoma, was a longtime Yankees star, a fan favorite and face of the franchise. “By 1960, he was a myth,” recalls George Vescey, who as a 22-year-old newlywed and rookie reporter for New York’s Newsday covered the Yankees in 1961.
Their pursuit of the magical mark of 60, set by the Yankees’ legend in 1927, captured the imaginations of the nation’s baseball fans and dominated America’s sports sections. In an epic drama spiced with improbable plot twists, New York Yankees stars Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris dueled in 1961 to break Babe Ruth’s Major League Baseball season record for home runs.
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