Nam Y. Huh/AP
Sammy Sosa helped bring baseball back to life.
“There’s nothing quite like that ‘98 [home-run] race,” former Cubs teammate Derrek Lee said. “I don’t recall a time before or after where guys were on the field for batting practice to watch the other team’s guy hit. We were literally on the field to watch Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa hit batting practice.
“The fans gravitated to him and brought that spark back to baseball.”
Sosa earned a good chunk of the credit for the Cubs evolving from “Lovable Losers” into a team carrying winning expectations into every season, including this one.