When Albert Pujols recently hit the 600th home run of his career, I went to the Elias Book of Baseball Records to check its list of players Pujols joined. I was struck most by three names: Barry Bonds, Alex Rodriguez, Sammy Sosa.

Bonds heads the list with 762, Rodriguez is fourth with 696 and Sosa eighth with 609.

I cite these three former players because their home run totals are questionable. Their totals are questionable because the players who hit those home runs have been linked to the use of performance enhancing drugs. They hit the home runs, but how many did they hit that were chemically aided?

None of the 600 home runs Pujols hit has been questioned because he has never been linked to PEDs or accused of using them. He has nothing to confess. The same cannot be said for …

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Who said the New York Yankees couldn’t win as long as Brian Cashman is their general manager?

It seems to me that I might have said something like that in questioning why the Yankees continue to retain Cashman when he would have been fired long ago if George Steinbrenner were still running the team. However, Hal Steinbrenner, who is running the team, is a different boss, and he seems to be intent on being the anti-George.

That change has benefited Cashman, and the Yankees have unexpectedly played the first third of the season in a way that is also beneficial to …

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At first glance, not to mention second, third, fourth and fifth, Statcast might as well be Greek, as in it’s all Greek to me. I usually don’t like to write about people or things I don’t like because writing about them gives them undeserved notice.

However, in this instance I am making an exception because while I have no use for Statcast, beyond that I don’t understand why it exists. I don’t care for modern metrics, but at least the people who live and die by them think they have some value.

The practitioners of modern metrics need the numbers they create to know who is and who isn’t a good player. They are so busy concocting and using what they arrogantly call advanced metrics (as opposed to old-fashioned statistics) that they can’t watch games and let their eyes tell them who is and who isn’t a good player.

Statcast, however, goes beyond …

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