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Is it Barry Bonds' surly personality or are we just getting spoiled? How else
to explain the curious feeling that Bonds' 73-home run season, a feat that four
years ago was unfathomable, was not just fathomed but by the end almost
expected? If this power performance keeps up, perhaps the voices of those
decrying juiced baseballs and juiced biceps will be heard at full blast, but not
likely. After all, the dinghies, fishing nets and scuba divers crowding McCovey
Cove were great fun, and baseball will be forgiven if it manages to entertain in
this day and age. This was a season of broken records, and bread-and-butter ones
at that, not the kind dreamed up by stats gurus in their basements. Not only did
Bonds eclipse Mark McGwire's three-year-old home run record with a flurry of
four homers in his last three starts, but also he broke Babe Ruth's 78-year-old
single-season walks record with 177 and Ruth's 81-year-old slugging percentage
mark (.847). San Diego's Rickey Henderson, still Rickey after all these years,
crawled past Ruth's career walks record, finishing with 2,141, and slid
unnecessarily (but jovially) into home upon breaking Ty Cobb's career runs mark,
ending up with 2,248. At the other end of the age spectrum, 21-year-old
Cardinals outfielder Albert Pujols set an NL rookie RBI record with 130 and
fellow "rookie" Ichiro Suzuki, late of nine years in the Japan League,
joined Fred Lynn as the only players to win Rookie of the Year and MVP in the
same season. By leading his Mariners to 116 wins -- tying the 1906 Cubs for the
all-time record -- the majors' first Japanese-born position player proved that
while there's no 'I' in team, there is an Ichiro.
--Jamal
Greene
Sports Illustrated, October 15, 2001: It's a Wrap
Swing King: Relive all 73 Bonds homers
Video Box: Bonds discusses his historic achievement 
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Photographs by John W. McDonough, V.J. Lovero, Brad Mangin
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