[B-Man]

MLB turned into "Nintendo baseball" back in 1994. That's when the most recent hitting explostion started. Griffey has played the majority of his career during this period and all his prime years.

My unscientific observation was that the offensive explosion started in the late 90s and has continued. After reading your email, I did a quick check of the stats. In 1994, there were 1774 home runs in the AL, which was about average for the period 1988-1994. In 1995, there were over 2,100 home runs, and in 1996, there were 2,742. Since then the fewest number of home runs that have been hit in the AL for a season is 2464. In the NL, the trend is similar.

So, Griffey played some of his prime in the Nintendo era, but certainly doesn't have as many prime years in this era as players like A-Rod, Delgado, Vlad, Andruw, or even Bonds (who is either still in his prime at an advanced age or is in a steroid-induced second prime).

What 10 year period is that? He was a rookie in 1989. He started his decline in 2000 when he joined Cincinnati. Griffey certainly wasn't the best player in the game during his first few years (Rickey Henderson comes to mind). He was great in 1994 but injured in 1995. 1996 was his first monster year with .303, 42, 140.

I didn't say he was the best player in the AL every year for 10 years, but from 1990 - 1999, I would say he was probably the best overall player in the AL. For several of those years he was the best player, and for the rest of the years he was very good (or injured, as you noted).