753 (3 away) -- Barry Bonds All-Time MLB HR Record Pursuit thread

The fans in Chicago didn't throw the balls back? Didn't they read Rick Reilly's very important back-page column?

 

1. Bonds will indeed get a laugh. Whether it will be the last one really won't be known until five years after he retires.
2. Selig already looks like a jerk.
3. The rest of your drivel really doesn't merit a response.

 

Roger Maris didn't have that respect, admiration and love during his chase for 61.

And neither did Hank Aaron, who, in addition to the simple racists, also was panned by those who simply didn't want to see Ruth's record fall and who considered Aaron's mark more a credit to longevity than his prowess as a home run hitter.

The passing of time has made Maris and Aaron into more heroic figures . . . but at the time of their achivements, there was plenty of hate.

 

I was out in the Wrigley bleachers this week--took my 15 yr old son and some of his pals.

I've been in those bleachers maybe a couple hundred times, long before 1984 brought $100 scalper prices and Mai-Tais and girls in spike heels.

I have never--NEVER--heard such raw distaste and vitriol for a player as when Bonds came to bat. Not the funny raunchy stuff that makes you proud to be a bleacher bum, the stuff you sheepishly have to explain to your kids on the way home....this was just sullen disgust.

Bonds will have his record, and that's all he'll have.

 

Granted, the game hardly has a shred of integrity left, but here's a troubling scenario (at least, it's troubling to me): Bonds hits his second homer of the game tonight in Milwaukee, bringing him even with Aaron and bringing the Giants to, say, within a run of the Brewers in the sixth inning. Bochy pulls him, even though there's a chance he could come up again in the eighth or ninth inning with the game on the line, and Barry is not seen again the rest of the series.

Would Bochy do this? Would he forego trying to win for the sake of having a record set in a particular ballpark? I've always had the impression he was a guy who respected the game and the spirit of competition, but the sense I'm getting is that steps are going to be taken to rig it so Bonds breaks the record at home.

 

Speaking of that column, Bonds was about 0 for 8 zillion before SI decided to put Hank Aaron on its cover this week. Guess the jinx even applies to retired athletes.

 

Just added a link to Mariotti's article I excerpted in "reply #28" of this thread. Sorry for its original omittance.
- - - - - - - -

Here is a link to an article where the former Tokyo Yomiuri Giant and current worldwide professional major leagues' home run king (868) Sadaharu Oh expresses sympathy and respect for Barry Bonds and Bonds' pending accomplishment:

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/sports/orl-sptoh20072007jul20,0,2864121,print.story

Unlike Aaron, Oh is ready to acknowledge Bonds -- dogged by allegations of steroids use -- as the American record-holder if and when he passes 755. Aaron has been openly disdainful of Bonds. He says he won't be in attendance to watch Bonds set the record and has professed such indifference to the challenger that he facetiously told reporters he did not know how to spell Bonds' name.

Though he says steroid use should be condemned, Oh notes that Bonds, even if he did use them, still had to hit the homers to reach the record. Oh complains that the media have focused unfairly on illegal substances after the home-run-derby years of the 1990s.

"Yes, I feel sorry for him," Oh says of Bonds. "At that time, steroids were not banned. Did all players who took steroids hit more home runs? Of course they're not a good thing, and young players should be told they're bad. . . . You can't change what happened in the past. And the fact is: He hit those home runs."

It's easy to see why Oh is held in such high regard. In the article he makes no attempt to claim his record be held in higher regard than what soon will be Bonds' MLB home run record. Some hope that Aaron will, with the passing of time, develop a similar grace towards Bonds' seemingly-inevitable overtaking of his record.
- - - - - - - -

Earlier today on Fox Sports Radio, a member of KNBR 680/1050 AM's on-air talent said that the discussion around the Giants' press box is that the team's PR slogan for next year will be "Come see Barry chase 3,000 hits," intimating that not only is Barry going to play another year, but that many in the press box believe that he will do so with the Giants.

I believe that if he stays healthy, Bonds will play next year. But I think he would be better-served by doing so in the American League, where the toll on his body would be much less and his badly-faded defensive skills could be permanently put to rest while playing as a DH. Time will tell what option - including retirement - Bonds chooses or is forced to choose.

 

Instead of my usual rant, I'll just stick to this:

*

 

I just modified my last post to include a new article excerpt and link, as well as to give information from a Bay Area media member's take on Bonds' status for next year

 

Figures you wouldn't.

 

Damn fine writing.