George Kenneth Griffey, Jr. (born November 21,
1969 in Donora, Pennsylvania) is an American Major
League Baseball player. He was raised in
Cincinnati, Ohio, where his father, Ken Griffey,
Sr., played most of his best years with the
Cincinnati Reds. The younger Griffey played at
Moeller High School, a Catholic school in
Cincinnati better known for its football program.
As a Major League Baseball player he has compiled
superior hitting statistics, and was awarded a
Gold Glove Award for defensive excellence in 10
consecutive seasons, from 1990 to 1999, while
playing center field for the Seattle Mariners.
Griffey, Jr. played on the same team as his father
with the Seattle Mariners in 1990 and 1991.

Griffey, Jr.'s career began with the Seattle
Mariners in 1989. He won the American League Most
Valuable Player award in 1997, hitting .304, with
56 home runs and 147 runs batted in. He signed a
long-term contract with the Cincinnati Reds
following the 1999 season. He has been
injury-prone since joining the Reds. Ken Griffey,
Sr. has been one of the team's coaches. During
Griffey Jr.'s tenure with the Seattle Mariners,
he established himself over the years as one of
baseball's premier players, with the potential of
being considered one of the greatest players ever.
He was a multi-dimensional player during a time
when more and more players usually excelled at
either hitting or fielding, but rarely both.
Griffey could hit with high average, batting over
.300 for seven of the ten years of the 1990s, and
hit with power as well, by hitting 422 home runs
during the decade. His abilities in centerfield
arguably were paralleled by no one. Griffey often
made over the shoulder catches, the kind that
Willie Mays immortalized during the 1954 World
Series, with a play simply known as the Catch. For
these reasons, Ken Griffey, Jr. was one of
baseball's most respected and well liked players
during the 1990s, as one could routinely see his
picture on cereal boxes and television
commercials, and he was a mainstay of the All-Star
Game during the decade.

Despite Griffey, Jr.'s fantastic performance, and
seemingly bright future in Seattle, he nonetheless
became disenchanted with playing for the Mariners.
Publicly, he expressed frustration over what he
believed a lack of commitment to winning from the
management of the Mariners. Also, there was
speculation that Griffey was very unhappy with
Seattle's new Safeco Field, in which it was much
more difficult to maintain the level of power he
had while playing in the Kingdome. It's been
reported that Griffey, Jr., among other Mariners
players, requested the architects of Safeco Field
bring the fences closer to home plate. However,
much to the players' chagrin, the architects
designed a park with a deep center field. This,
combined with Safeco being at sea level, and
Seattle's generally dense, moisture-laden
atmosphere, helped create a "pitcher friendly"
ball park. In the summer of 1999, it was reported
that Ken Griffey, Jr. hit a ball that would likely
have been a home run in the Kingdome, but turned
into a long fly-out to center in Safeco. Griffey,
Jr. then stormed angrily to the Mariner dugout
telephone, called the Mariner's general manager,
and demanded to be traded that day. Although
Griffey, Jr. has always denied his concern with
baseball records, his behavior seemed to indicate
in 1999 that he definitely had his ambitions set
towards breaking Hank Aaron's all time home run
record.

Griffey, Jr. ultimately got his wish, and started
the 2000 season with his father's former team,
the Cincinnati Reds. Initially, the future looked
extremely bright for him there - he was given an
extremely warm welcome by the fans of Cincinnati,
and Griffey, Jr. was reportedly very pleased to be
playing on his father's former team. On the open
market, Griffey, Jr. could have made several
million dollars more than the contract offered by
the small market and notoriously penurious Reds,
thus showing how much he wanted to play for them.
However, the 2000 season began what has become the
long, steady, and painful decline of Griffey's
Jr's superstar status. Although his statistics
during this season were respectable, they were far
below his previous level of play, hitting .271
with 40 home runs, and playing 145 games. From the
2001 season onwards, Griffey, Jr. has been plagued
by various injuries, and the last three years have
seen season ending injuries. Many speculate the
injuries are a result of a decade of playing on
the Kingdome's artificial turf, which players
claim is like playing the game on asphalt.
Whatever their causes, injuries have forced
Griffey, Jr. to play in only 206 out of 486 games
in the last three years. Consequently, he is not
nearly the ubiquitous presence he once was on
cereal boxes, television commercials, and the
All-Star game.


In 2004, Griffey, Jr. avoided major injury during
the first half of the season and on June 20 became
the 20th player to reach 500 career home runs.
(The 500th home run came on Father's Day in a
game against the St. Louis Cardinals at Busch
Stadium, with his father Ken Sr. in the stands.
Ironically, it also tied him with his father for
career hits—2,143.) However, the injury bug struck
again just before the All-Star break; he suffered
a partial hamstring tear, knocking him out of the
All-Star Game and putting him on the disabled
list.

Ken Griffey, Jr. finished the 2004 season on the
disabled list after suffering a complete rupture
of his right hamstring in San Francisco on August
11. The play in question occurred at SBC Park in a
game against the San Francisco Giants. Griffey was
starting in right field for the first time in his
16-year Major League career when he raced toward
the gap to try to cut off a ball before it got to
the wall. He slid as he got to the ball, but in
the process hyperextended his right leg. He later
came out of the game, complaining of "tightness"
in the hamstring exacerbated by chilly conditions
in San Francisco. But there was fa