Chicago Cubs: A history of notable Home Run Derby performances

Chicago Cubs: Sosa Y2K’s his way to victory

I remember sitting in the gymnasium of my elementary school as a 10-year-old waiting for an assembly to begin. If my memory serves me correctly, a Tae-Kwon-Do school from the area was coming to perform a demonstration. A couple of minutes before it was about to start, the power went out, and, my friend, who was sitting next to me yelled out for the entire school to hear, “Y2K!”

The year 2000 was a transformative experience in many people’s eyes. It was also the year Sammy Sosa took home his first derby crown. Sosa was well into his Cubs career by 2000. He came into the all-star break, having smashed 23 home runs with a 140 OPS+.

Sosa breezed his way through the competition, which set up a championship round with back-to-back winner Ken Griffey Jr. Sitting on five outs to play, Sosa launched a shot into left field, which got Chris Berman yelling about the moon and lunar eclipses. A couple of balls later, Sosa launched to near dead center field, onto the concourse.

Seemingly tiring out, with two outs left to play with, Sosa once again sent Berman into a tizzy, this time with an upper deck shot landing in the very back rows. He would finish with nine home runs in the final round, which was good enough to land Sosa his first derby crown.