Bonds' feat doesn't sit well with longtime Atlanta folk

The memory of Hank Aaron's 715th home run won't fade from Atlanta fans anytime soon. AP

Tom Verducci The People's King: Aaron's home run mark of 755 will endure as a magical number. Serving Up History Catching up with Al Downing, Steve Trachsel and more milestone gopherball pitchers. In His Own Words Often surly and even melancholy, Bonds is always outspoken when it comes to Bonds. The Milestones Take a look back at Bonds' landmark home runs: from No. 100 to 715 and beyond. Hammerin' Hank A career retrospective of the man who first surpassed the Babe's longstanding record. Sports Villians Some consider Bonds one of the true 'bad guys' in the sports world, but he has plenty of company. SI Covers See each of Bonds' eight appearances on the cover of Sports Illustrated. Bonds makes history with No. 756 | VIDEO Heyman: Selig wiggles out of date with history Survey: Is Bonds the true Home Run King? Donovan: Bonds holds record, but he's no hero Taylor: Bonds' ability never in question React: Should Selig have been there? Time.com: Where are the HR balls now? Time.com: The Man With Million Dollar Balls Donovan: Bonds leaves no doubt in San Diego Tale of the Tape: Barry Bonds vs. Darth Vader Markazi: Downing relishes link to Aaron's 715th Baseball Prospectus: Heirs to the throne Freedman: Corporate America shuns Bonds Photos: The Growing Legend of Bonds Excerpt: Game of Shadows | Afterword

ATLANTA -- Here in The Hammer's hometown, they still hail him as baseball's Home Run King. They always will. Barry Bonds may be the career home run leader. He may have 756 ... and 757 ... and counting. Yet Hank Aaron is still royalty, neither 'rithmetic nor 'roids. And Barry?

Junk Bonds.

"Let's celebrate a real hero, not a loaded hero," a man said Wednesday afternoon, the day after Bonds belted his 756th homer into the San Francisco night to surpass Aaron. "Celebrate steroids? Please."

The man was standing in a parking lot across the street from Turner Field. Near the spot where, 33 years earlier, Aaron lined his 715th homer to break Babe Ruth's record of 714. Once Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium was torn down a decade ago, they paved paradise and put up a parking lot. Yet a portion of the left-field wall, and a blue chain-link fence in the precise location where Aaron's blast went over the fence and into history, were preserved. A large white baseball painted on the wall proclaims:

HANK AARON
HOMERUN
715
April 18, 1974

"Babe Ruth had his faults," said the middle-aged man, who asked that his name not be used. "My God, Ty Cobb was a horrible guy. But not ripped-to-the-tits on drugs."

In Atlanta, as in much of Baseball America, the consensus is this:

Yes, Bonds hit the most homers. No, he's not the same lithe little hitter Pittsburgh first signed, nor the five-tool superstar who was baseball's best player for much of the '90s. Most folks here suspect Bonds began taking steroids after the Mark McGwire-Sammy Sosa Great Home Run Chase of 1998. Passing Aaron seemed inevitable. Whether it's ever proven that Bonds took steroids, Hank Aaron is above suspicion and beyond reproach.

They all think so:

The Milwaukee native-turned-Atlanta transplant who still pines for the Milwaukee Braves of his youth. His son, the college senior and budding broadcaster. The Atlanta guy who was in attendance the night Aaron hit 715. A group of Korean businessmen and baseballs fans who, shortly after landing in Atlanta Wednesday afternoon, made Turner Field their first stop.

Even a nun: Sister Rosemary, a baseball fan at Our Lady of Perpetual Help, a cancer hospice that sits in the shadow of Turner Field. Even the nun thinks Bonds' record-setter is, well, nunsence.

"I by no means condone the steroid use," Sister Rosemary, who grew up up north as a Yankees fan but now pulls for both the Braves and Yanks, said Thursday. "That takes the whole legitimacy out of what he's accomplished.

"That's the tragic part of it," she said. "He's a good athlete and I think he could have accomplished as much without it [steroids] -- perhaps not get these figures now, but eventually. It [performance-enhancing drugs] has entered into all sports, but it just seems baseball is the all-American sport. It's just sad.

"Why not accept the talents God's given you, and be satisfied with that?" Sister Rosemary said. "It's greed. It sours people on [the accomplishment]. It just puts a whole dark side on it. I'm happy for him, but I'd have been happier for him it he'd have done it the right way.

"Nice talking to you," the good Sister said. "God bless."

"As any fan, I'm sorry it's clouded," said Louis Rice, 55, who was in the stands the night Aaron hit 715. "In all the hoo-ha over the home run chase, well, Bonds is one of the greatest outfielders ever to play the game. He's a Hall of Famer. Steroids or not, hitting 756 home runs is something you don't see every day.

"But it's bittersweet for me," Rice said. "Aaron is a personal hero of mine. I don't like to see one of his records fall. But it was inevitable. More than anything, I was delighted to hear that Aaron had taped his little testimonial [a congratulatory video to Bonds], even though he was a little wooden, like he was ordering from a menu. But it was a class act on his part.

"I'm just ticked off at Bud Selig," he said. "This all happened on his watch. And he stands there [in the stands in San Francisco, when Bonds hit his 755th to tie Aaron], with his hands in his pockets, and doesn't know what to do.

"If Selig really cared about [steroids in baseball], he should have done something about it back then [in '98 and later]," Rice said.

"Now, he just looks like a horse's ass."

In April 2004, Rice wrote a remembrance of that starry night when he and three friends sat in the stands and watched Bad Henry belt 715.

"It was 30 years ago today," the story began. On Wednesday night, while watching on TV as the Mets rallied to beat the Braves 4-3, Rice reflected:

"It's not so much I wish Bonds wasn't under a suspicion of steroids. I just wish he wasn't a jerk. Hell, there have been lots of jerks in baseball. Bonds wasn't the first. I just wish I could be happier about this. As happy as the night I saw Aaron hit number 715. That was the most thrilling night I've ever spent in a ballpark in my life."

1 of 2