The style of the two major leagues became ingrained over the years. The American League method relied on some slugger bashing a three-run homer. If you wanted speed and strategy, that was the domain of the National League. The AL harvested runs with the designated hitter. The NL cultivated them with the sacrifice bunt.
The stolen base, then, fit squarely into the NL view. Compare the leagues in any year, and you would find the NL stealing more bases than the AL.
"If you would have asked me who's leading, the NL or the AL, I would have said the NL," said Red Sox center fielder Jacoby Ellsbury.
And Ellsbury would be wrong. The early season quietly has shredded convention about how the American League approaches the game, a shift that provides more evidence of a changing sport.
The AL has stolen more bases than the NL twice in the past 15 years, but it could happen this year for the first time since 2001. Going into last night, American League teams have stolen 321 bases compared with the National League's 284, despite having played 29 fewer games. At the current pace, AL teams will steal a total of 1,654 bases this season, which would be their most since 1998 and 337 more than last season.
As evidence of the trend, the Red Sox need look no further than the series they just concluded and the one they are about to begin. The Tampa Bay Rays are lapping the major leagues in stolen bases, having swiped 53. The Los Angeles Angels, against whom the Sox open a series tonight, rank second with 37. The Sox themselves have helped push the trend. They've stolen 25 bags, tied for fourth in the majors.
The way teams try to score has, at once, harkened to earlier eras and evolved.
"Nobody is sitting back waiting for the home run," said Rays left fielder Carl Crawford, who leads the majors with 22 steals. "All the steroids and stuff are gone. You've got to focus on guys who can find other ways to score runs.
"In the American League, it seems like guys are running. It's the new era. It's the new way to play. We're finding guys who can run and do a lot of things."
The adoption of drug testing apparently has forced teams to rethink their strategy. American League home run totals hit their lowest point since 1995 over the past two seasons, down to one per game last year and 0.99 in 2007.
Home runs steadily have decreased for several seasons, but stolen base totals have exploded only this year. Another turning point accompanied baseball's crackdown on performance-enhancing drugs: The Rays won the American League championship last year, and they did so while leading the league with 142 stolen bases.
