Hitting home runs is supposed to be hard

One of the most quoted lines in the movie "Moneyball" is when the Ron Washington character says to the Scott Hatteberg character, about playing first base, that "it's incredibly hard."

That line resonates because:

1. Washington is using blunt terms to cut through the BS that Billy Beane is attempting to lay on a reluctant Hatteberg in order to get him to sign and play first.

2. Baseball is hard. We want it to be hard. We watch it because it's hard.

We know it's hard because we played it and at some point, long before getting even close to a pro career, we gave it up because it was too hard.

Also we know it's hard because people in major league baseball say it's hard all the time. Sometimes a player will say about some superstar, "He makes it look easy." Implied in that phrase is that for the rest of them, a whole bunch of them, the game is freaking hard.

This brings me to the Home Run Derby. I didn't watch it. I haven't watched it for the last 3 or 4 times. I've written before on here how I think the HR Derby is not for me. I really should just turn off my brain and just enjoy it for what it is, but how can I do that with all the yelling?

There's just too much hype. I hate hype. Nothing about it is real. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. won the HR Derby with 72 total home runs. But they weren't really home runs. They were too easy. Home runs are supposed to be hard. Being able to select your own pitcher and then having that person lob balls into the strike zone for you, that's not a challenge I find interesting.

Sure, you need to have athletic prowess and elite timing and coordination even to launch a ball 400-plus feet. But I don't think it warrants the hysteria. Nobody in that situation was trying to get the batter out. 

So when people say "the Home Run Derby is better than the All-Star Game" -- and they do, a lot -- what they mean is they find the HR Derby more interesting than the All-Star Game. Because it's not better.

Every homer hit in the All-Star Game was well-earned because it came off an elite All-Star pitcher, trying to get the hitter out.

Stan Musial holds the record for the most All-Star home runs.

He didn't hit 72 All-Star home runs. He didn't even hit the 25 that Vlad Jr hit in the Derby finals.

Musial hit 6. That wouldn't have even gotten him out of the Derby first round!

Musial has been the all-time All-Star Game home run leader since 1960. With 6! Because home runs are supposed to be hard.

Musial held the record when he hit his 5th in 1956, too. Because no one else has hit more than 4.

Ted Williams, possibly the greatest hitter of all-time, has 4 All-Star Game home runs.

If Williams isn't the greatest hitter of all-time, maybe it's Willie Mays. He also hit four All-Star Game home runs.

So did Fred Lynn. Unlike those previous three guys, I've seen all of Lynn's ASG home runs.

All of those guys have hit three ASG home runs. That's all it takes to get you in the top 10 all-time. Because the game and hitting home runs is stupid hard.

Yet it looks incredibly easy in HR Derby. Maybe that's why so many people like it. It's glitz and it's loud and there are balls flying out of the park every 5 seconds complete with the oohs and aahs you hear on the 4th of July. 

But I'm not entertained. Even the ASG doesn't do it for me anymore with its commercialism and pitch limits. But I'll tape it tonight and then fast-forward to the good parts, maybe even catch a real HR or two.

I get it. The All-Star Game sometimes isn't the spectacle that HR Derby is. That's because the game dictates the excitement level, it's not artificially created. Also, HR Derby focuses on the individual and that's been the focus for the last generation -- on the individual. Heck, that's the way it's been in card collecting, more player collectors, fewer people focused on the team.

But the HR Derby isn't baseball to me. The ASG is. For now, anyway. And there doesn't even need to be home run -- an actual home run -- for me to enjoy the game.