Hey, Guys, Watch Your Backs--Here Comes Sammy!

By Wendy Cole

For most of his career, nobody thought of Sammy Sosa as a legend chaser. The amiable but erratic Chicago Cubs outfielder was better known for throwing to the wrong bases and stealing at impractical times. Same thing at bat: flailing wildly, the power hitter seemed to go for the fences with every swing. Result: last year he struck out more than anyone in the National League.

But that was last year. Fast on the heels of Mark McGwire and Ken Griffey Jr., Sosa is the dark-horse candidate to shatter the single-season record for home runs. Thanks to a spectacular--some might say freaky--June in which he popped 20 home runs, a major league record, the Dominican native showed that he is finally harnessing his impulsiveness. As of Saturday, he had racked up 36 homers, just six behind leader McGwire. Sosa's batting record of .319 this season is a full .57 points higher than his career average.

Chalk it up to maturity. At 29, in his 10th major league season, the unusually lean slugger has learned that discipline at the plate can be just as valuable as brute strength. His raw skills were never in question (he has belted 36 or more dingers in each of the past three years), but his judgment needed seasoning. "A few years ago, I was trying to do too much," he says. "I'd go to the home plate with no idea and swing at everything."

He got a late start, not playing organized ball until he was 14. As a child in the Dominican Republic, he was occupied selling oranges for 10[cents] apiece and shining shoes for 25[cents] to help support his widowed mother, four brothers and two sisters in their two-room flat. When former Texas Ranger scout Omar Minaya spotted Sosa playing ball as a 16-year-old in 1985, Minaya recalls that the 150-lb., 5-ft. 10-in. kid, dressed in a borrowed uniform, looked both athletically promising and malnourished. Last year Sosa signed a four-year contract for $42.5 million. Beneficiaries of his generous spirit abound. His mother now resides in the third house he has bought for her, and he has purchased 250 computers for poor schools back home.

But perhaps the greatest testament of Sosa's worth is the fact that he has provided Bulls-obsessed Chicagoans--at least for the moment--with a distraction from their nervous preoccupation with the future of Michael Jordan and the rest of the world champion hoopsters. "The fans around here are crazy about Sosa," says Ron Stampley, manager of the Cubby Bear, a popular sports bar near Wrigley Field. "They cheer for him as loudly as they cheer for Jordan." Indeed, Sosa's slugging streak, along with wunderkind pitcher Kerry Wood's arm and first baseman Mark Grace's hot bat, is helping to make the long-hapless Cubs into contenders for the first time in a decade. Having played well over .500 ball all season, by last Saturday the team was just 5 games out of first place in the central division.

In fact, Sosa's performance--and the team's--have jelled precisely at the time the slugger quit acting as if he were trying to carry the Cubs by himself. He immersed himself in videos of other hitters in the off season and has tuned in fully to the advice of Cub coaches. "I always thought this guy could really put up some gigantic numbers if we could get him to swing at better pitches and get him to be more patient," said batting coach Jeff Pentland. Sosa agrees: "I don't want to go to the home plate with the idea that I need to hit a home run. I just want to relax and use all the field. When I do that, I know I can hit a home run at any moment." But when asked last week to assess his own chances of surpassing 61 homers for the record, the Cubbie, however, showed that his newfound maturity as a player does not always translate to humility off the field. "Why not 70?" he retorted. "You never know what can happen in this game."

--By Wendy Cole. Reported by Julie Grace, with the Cubs

With reporting by Julie Grace, with the Cubs