On July 14th in 1967 and 1968, two different players went into the history books by hitting their 500th Major League homer. In 1967, Eddie Mathews of the Astros hit his 500th home run off San Francisco’s Juan Marichal at Candlestick Park helping the Houston defeat San Francisco 8-6. Then exactly a year later, in 1968, Hank Aaron got his 500th home run off San Francisco’s Mike McCormick as the Atlanta Braves beat the Giants 4-2.

There are currently 28 members of the 500 Home Runs Club. That Matthews and Aaron both joined that esteemed group on the same date exactly a year apart is one of those weird statistical coincidences that happens in baseball, and in life in general.

Homers are the gateway drug of baseball fandom. They are big, and impressive, and get everyone’s attention. There is a reason why the most popular part of All-Star Week for most fans is the Home Run Derby.

But baseball is about so much more than homers. Let’s take a quick look at the two players who are currently leading the Majors in Home Runs as of today: Aaron Judge (34 homers); Shohei Ohtani (29 homers).

Many articles I have read this week have these two listed as their first half MVP candidates: Judge for American League, Ohtani for National League.

Let’s do a deeper dive into this. Ohtani is DHing this year as he recovers from surgery to his pitching arm. That means that his only contribution to his Dodger’s team is the 4-5 times he gets into the batter’s box. Nothing else. How can that be MVP worthy? I submit that by definition he can’t even be the MVP of his own team. (That honor rightfully belongs to Mookie Betts, broken hand and all.)

Anyone who has watched Aaron Judge as he plays centerfield knows that he is not very good at the position by Major League standards. While he is surprisingly agile for such a large man, he is not the proto-typical centerfielder. Think Andruw Jones, Byron Buxton, Michael A. Taylor, and Willie Mays. The only defensive highlight featuring Judge is the one last year where he knocked down the outfield wall/gate.

The counter argument on Judge, of course, is that he is good enough to play a position only three dozen or so people in the world can possibly play for a storied franchise that is winning a lot of baseball games. So he probably does belong the MVP discussion (even though he is a f—ing Yankee).

From this fan’s perspective, home runs are overrated and hence over-weighted in both traditional and modern baseball statistics. They are just one of many ways that a Major League player contributes to his team’s success or failure on any given day.

As I have said here before, I would like it if there were more focus on some of those other aspects of the game: defense, getting on base, base running, situational hitting, and bunting. Things that numbers do not do a real good job of measuring or recognizing. Things you learn to appreciate the more time you spend with the game.