On August 7th, 2007, on a beautiful night in San Fransicsco, the sold-out crowd at AT&T Park was buzzing! In a tight 4-4 game against the Washington Nationals in the bottom of the fifth, Barry Lamar Bonds stepped into the batter’s box.
As the opposing pitcher, Mike Bacsik wiped the sweat off his brow, trying to calm his nerves as he set to face off against one of the most feared batters in Major League Baseball history. On a 3-2 count, he delivers the pitch, and just like that, the ball sails into the night sky, causing an uproar in the crowd. History had been made, and number 756 stood tall, surpassing Hank Aaron’s thirty-year record!
Barry Bonds By the Numbers
Throughout the years, there has been a lot of controversy that has followed the career of Barry Bonds. Don’t get it twisted, he was still the most dominant hitter in any era in America’s Pastime. Obviously, he had been linked to baseball’s steroids scandal in an era when a lot of big-time players were juicing. To this day, there is a debate over whether these players should be considered for Hall of Fame eligibility, but let’s just look at the numbers.
Barry Bonds was so great that some can argue he had two Hall of Fame careers wrapped into one. In a career that spanned 22 years, he won seven National League Most Valuable Player Awards! Think about that! Almost a third of his career was MVP-caliber seasons! Oh, by the way, you add eight Gold Gloves, twelve Silver Sluggers, and fourteen All-Star selections.
The big lefty from Riverside, California, ended his career with the most Home Runs in MLB history with 762 and the single-season record in 2001 with 73. We can talk about “chicks digging the long ball” all we want, but here is where the real dominance comes in. If you don’t think this man was feared when he stepped into the box, look at his walks, especially the intentional base on balls.
In his career, Bonds walked an immaculate record 2,558 times! Six hundred eighty-eight of those were due to being intentionally walked. Teams were willing to give him first base rather than let the man swing the bat! In 2004 alone, Barry was walked 120 times intentionally, which resulted in him reaching base 376 times with only 373 plate appearances! Read that stat again, it’s not a misprint or typo! Walks in baseball don’t count as plate appearances, so technically, the man reached base more times than he was up to bat.
Final Thoughts
The question always comes up: Should Barry Bonds be inducted into the Hall of Fame? Of course he should! Even if you have to put an asterisk next to his name, let the man in. He is literally the most feared baseball player to ever step into the batter’s box. In the 2004 season, he would have box scores that would read 1-1 with a Home Run and three walks. The guy may have seen one or two hittable pitches the entire night and was still able to hit into the bleachers or McCovey Cove!
During an era when Major League Baseball used the tagline “chicks dig the long ball,” they paradoxically penalized players for hitting them. Yes, you are violating the game’s integrity, but when the game uses you to promote and brand itself, does that make it okay? It seems a bit one-sided. Anyone who lived through the late 90s and early 00s knows exactly how dominant Barry Bonds was. Steroids or not, you still have to do the hardest thing in sports, and that is hitting a round ball with a round bat! It’s time to give him his flowers in Cooperstown!
