 Ruth had amassed 60 home runs in a season with only 154 games, but Maris was playing the first season in the American League's newly expanded 162-game season.Baseball Commissioner Ford Frick, a friend of Ruth's during the legendary slugger's lifetime, held a press conference to announce his "ruling" that should Maris take longer than 154 games both records would be acknowledged by Major League Baseball, but that some "distinctive mark" [his term] be placed next to Maris', which should be listed alongside Ruth's achievement in the "record books".The asterisk as such a mark was suggested at that time by New York Daily News sportswriter Dick Young, not Frick.