The son of New York Yankees' legend Roger Maris says he hopes baseball chiefs “do the right thing” by recognizing his father as the sport's greatest pure home-run hitter. “Too many things have gone on and now this has come out,” Rich Maris, the son of Roger Maris told the San Francisco Chronicle. “We think baseball will end up doing the right things with the records. “We think baseball will get it right, whether they restore or make some sort of mark on what's what.” The families comments come in the wake of Mark McGwire's admission Monday that he used steroids on and off for nearly a decade, including during the 1998 season when he broke Maris' then single-season home run record. McGwire feels his legacy should be one of a great long-ball hitter because he claims he didn't need performance-enhancing drugs to break Maris' 1961 record of 61 homers. But McGwire also said the Maris family have “every right to” consider their father's 61 home runs as the authentic record. McGwire hit 70 and then Barry Bonds surpassed him with 73 in 2001. Both McGwire and Bonds have been linked to performance-enhancing drugs leaving the Maris family to question whether their father should be considered the true single-season home run king. “I think my dad still holds the record,” Rich Maris said. McGwire called the widow of Roger Maris, Pat Maris, Monday before he went public with his admission and Rich said the family is willing to accept his apology. “He told her he had something to tell her,” Rich Maris said to the Chronicle. “He just wanted her to know the news was going to break and that he did steroids. “He apologized and that speaks volumes to the kind of guy he is. “We love him like a brother. I am glad he got it out.” Asked about the phone call on MLB network, McGwire said, “I felt that I needed to do that. They've been great supporters of mine. She was disappointed and she has every right to be.” McGwire has been eligible for American baseball's Hall of Fame for the past two years but he received a minuscule 23.5 percent of the vote from the Baseball Writers' Association of America his first year on the ballot and this year received 23.7 percent. McGwire claims he used drugs like Androstenedione and human growth hormone to rehabilitate his body from injury and not to cheat. McGwire didn't hesitate to blow his own horn when asked during a MLB Network interview if he could have hit 70 home runs in a single season without steroids. “Look at what God gave me,” McGwire told the network. “There is not a pill or an injection that will give an athlete the hand-eye co-ordination to hit a baseball. “They still talk about home runs I hit in high school.” The steroid admission by McGwire should encourage the sport to get tougher on drug cheats, World Anti-Doping Agency president John Fahey said Tuesday. “Mark McGwire's admission should encourage baseball to further step up its efforts against doping,” Fahey said in a statement. “Despite incremental progress, the Major League Baseball anti-doping program still falls short of the universally accepted standards of the World Anti-Doping Code.” MLB commissioner Bud Selig responded by saying the “so-called ‘steroid era' ... is clearly a thing of the past, and Mark's admission today is another step in the right direction.” However, former WADA president Dick Pound criticized Selig and said he's skeptical of claims that baseball is becoming cleaner. “I think the jury is still out on that issue and that the self-serving statements by Bud Selig do nothing to increase confidence,” Pound said in an e-mail. “What has emerged in the whole baseball mess is that drug use is widespread and that even the best players are involved – and still MLB is whistling past the graveyard.
