On Oct. 21, 1995, the World Series opened in Atlanta with two third basemen who had just completed their first full season in the big leagues: Chipper Jones of the Braves and Jim Thome of the Cleveland Indians.
Meanwhile, Trevor Hoffman of the San Diego Padres was preparing for rotator cuff surgery—a major procedure to fix an injury that occurred playing beach volleyball during the 1994 strike—and a kid in the Montreal Expos farm system, Vladimir Guerrero, fresh off a season in Class A ball, was preparing to jump to the big leagues the next year.
And at this nascent time in their careers, something else was taking root in the game: steroids.