Baseball: The Tenth Inning

1992 - 2009: As the tumultuous twentieth century is drawing to a close, and a new millennium begins, baseball continues to reflect the complicated country that created it. In an age of globalization and speculation, the players and the owners wage a cataclysmic battle over money and power; dazzlingly talented Latin and Asian stars transform the game; Cal Ripken becomes the game's new Iron Man; sluggers Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Barry Bonds do things that have never been done before; the Yankees build a dynasty while their arch rivals, the Red Sox, stage the greatest comeback in history. And in September of 2001, at a time when America seems most threatened, baseball offers the hope that things will one day return to normal. The national pastime is more popular, and more profitable, than ever, but suspicions and revelations about performance enhancing drugs keep surfacing, threatening the integrity of the game itself. Still, through it all, baseball endures, a game of infinite possibility and surpassing beauty.