Once upon a time major league baseball players cared if they struck out. Striking out was the sign of a weak, inept hitter. Striking out, in short, was embarrassing. No more.

In this new era of baseball, better to swing and miss but have a chance to hit a home run than have no chance at all.

Players have adjusted their swings to uppercut the ball, giving them a better chance to hit the ball over the wall or into the stands. There is, however, a downside to that approach, and that results is more strikeouts.

That is not to say that the increase in strikeouts is attributable entirely to the new hitting approach; hitters are capable of striking out through their own devices. But there is definitely a connection.

No major leaguer struck out 200 times in a season until Mark Reynolds struck out 204 times for Arizona in 2008. Reynolds quickly followed up his record-seeing performance, eclipsing his own record by striking out 223 times the following season. He threatened the record yet again in 2010 but fell short with a major league-leading 211.

Arizona traded Reynolds to Baltimore before the 2011 season, but he took his strikeout championship with him, striking out an American League-high 196 times in 2011.

Reynolds’ record has remained intact while he has played for the Indians, Yankees, Brewers, Cardinals and Rockies, but Adam Dunn and Chris Davis have threatened it, Dunn with 222 for the White Sox in 2012 and Davis with 219 for the Orioles in 2016.

For much of the last couple of months last season, Aaron Judge, the Yankees’ prominent rookie, looked as though he were a lock for the strikeout record. He was striking out in bunches, and it seemed that the only way he could avoid the Reynolds record was if the Yankees changed his seat from the dugout to a first-base box.

The Yankees, though, couldn’t afford to take him out of the lineup. They were fighting for a playoff spot, and Judge was an integral part of their lineup.

Judge stayed in the lineup, stopped striking out as frequently and the Yankees reached the playoffs.

Judge ended the season with 208 strikeouts, 15 behind Reynolds’ record. Given the direction in which baseball is headed, it won’t be long before 200 is just another number. Last year I had a conversation about this development with Bob Boone, a major league catcher for two decades and now a Washington Nationals executive.

Why doesn’t anyone care about strikeouts anymore, I asked Boone, who is the father of Aaron Boone, the Yankees’ new manager. “Sabermetrics guys say it’s not a big deal. Cyber works have done all that,” he said. “It’s just an out. There’s no caring about it like there used to be. You might hit a home run instead.”

Not everybody is sold on the idea, Boone included.

“A hundred years ago,” Boone said, exaggerating slightly, “when Greg Luzinski was in Double A and I was around, Deron Johnson was helping Greg a lot and he said, ‘You keep swinging like that, you’re going to strike out a hundred times. You’re not going to the big leagues if you strike out that much.’”

Luzinski got to the big leagues briefly in 1970 and struck out 32 times in 100 times at bat in 1971. He struck out more than 100 times in 10 of 13 seasons but reached 140 only twice and also hit 307 home runs in his career.

“It used to be embarrassing for a guy to strike out a hundred times,” Boone said. “I know it was for me personally. The embarrassment’s gone. Swing hard in case you hit it.”

I have a sheet of paper on which I have written strikeout data, the frequency with which some of the best hitters, mostly of the past 65 years, struck out. Today’s hitters would not recognize the statistics.

Henry Aaron played 23 years, hit 755 home runs and never struck out 100 times in his career.

Babe Ruth played for the Yankees for 15 years and averaged 79 strikeouts a season.

Roger Maris averaged 67 strikeouts a season.

Mickey Mantle averaged 112 strikeouts a season.

Barry Bonds averaged 102 strikeouts a season.

Near the end of the 2002 season, Jerry Royster, the Milwaukee Brewers manager, faced what he considered a dilemma. Jose Hernandez, the Brewers’ shortstop, had struck out 186 times that season and was only two strikeouts from tying Bobby Bonds’ then-major league record. The previous season Hernandez had struck out 185 times.

Royster didn’t want Hernandez to break the record, but realistically he knew the record was inevitable if Hernandez played the last 11 games.

Royster solved the dilemma by using Hernandez in some of the games but not putting him in a position where he could break the record. Hernandez struck out twice and finished the season with 188 strikeouts.