Bonds ties Ruth with homer No. 714
05/20/2006 5:51 PM ET
Bonds ties Ruth with homer No. 714
Giants slugger now 41 shy of Aaron's all-time record
By Barry M. Bloom / MLB.com
Barry Bonds is greeted by his son, Nikolai, after hitting career home run
No. 714. (Kevork Djansezian/AP)
OAKLAND -- One to go.
Giants slugger Barry Bonds took another step closer to the pantheon of the
baseball gods Saturday as he tied Babe Ruth for second on the all-time homer
list with the 714th of his 21-year career against the Oakland A's.
Bonds, 41 years old, is now 41 behind Hall of Famer Hank Aaron, who is the
all-time leading home run hitter in Major League Baseball history with 755.
The homer was Bonds' sixth of the season, and also tied him with Ruth as the
top left-handed home run hitter in MLB history. The solo shot came on a 1-1
pitch as Bonds led off the second inning against Oakland's Brad Halsey, with
Bonds taking the left-hander deep to right field.
Bonds and the sellout crowd of 35,077 at the McAfee Coliseum knew it was gone
the minute the 90-mph fastball connected off the bat. As he made his way
toward first base, Bonds pointed toward the front row of the seats behind the
dugout where his family was seated next to Giants president Larry Baer, Halsey
having just become the 420th pitcher to allow at least one of Bonds'
milestone homers.
The partisan San Francisco Bay Area crowd began to give Bonds a standing
ovation as he circled the bases and chanted "Barry, Barry," a mantra that was
repeated when he came to bat with a chance to pass the Bambino later in the
game. It had almost been two weeks and 40 plate appearances since Bonds hit
homer No. 713 on May 7 in Philadelphia and he had been 4-for-29 with 10 walks
and been hit by a pitch once since then.
By the time Bonds reached home plate, where he hugged his 16-year-old son,
Nikolai -- a batboy for the Giants on Saturday -- the noise had reached its
crescendo. Bonds met his teammates in a group hug in front of the team's
first-base dugout and then blew kisses into the stands toward his wife, Liz,
and daughters, Aisha and Shikari.
After that, Bonds stepped forward from the dugout and doffed his helmet to the
cheering throng. And then did it again, responding to a curtain call.
The 390-foot homer was caught by Tyler Snyder, who snared it with his glove as
if he was catching a picnic fly ball. Snyder, 19 and a resident of nearby
Pleasanton, Calif., then left the ballpark, an A's spokesman said.
Ruth hit No. 714, the last homer of his illustrious career, on May 25, 1935,
as a member of the Boston Braves. The homer, coming at Pittsburgh's old Forbes
Field, was his last of a three-homer, six-RBI outburst that day. The Babe
played his last game five days later. At the time, former Yankees teammate
Lou Gehrig was second on the all-time list with 352 homers, according to David
Vincent of SABRE.
Aaron, who came up with the Braves and moved with them from Milwaukee to
Atlanta, tied Ruth nearly 39 years later -- on April 4, 1974, Opening Day of
that baseball season at Cincinnati's old Riverfront Stadium. Aaron passed the
Bambino on April 8, 1974, at Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium.
Bonds, whose Ruth-tying homer was hit a little more than 32 years after
Aaron's, continues to play on a gimpy right knee. Bonds says that his right
knee is consistently sore, a condition that has become chronic since he had
surgery three times on the knee last year, the first two to remove and repair
torn meniscus and the last to flush out a serious bacterial infection that
threatened the very existence of his leg.
Bonds hit homer No. 700 against San Diego Padres right-hander Jake Peavy on
Sept. 17, 2004, at AT&T Park, the ballpark nestled on China Basin. It has been
an odyssey, but it has taken Bonds nearly 19 months since then to tie the
Sultan of Swat.
The knee surgeries kept him out of all except 14 games last season and limited
him to five home runs, the low figures in both categories of his career.
Barry M. Bloom is a national reporter for MLB.com. This story was not subject
to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
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問我為何住西子灣頭
只因滄海是我的鄰居
余光中 作
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