Me too. Mike Schmidt is my favourite player, and always will be.
I will say this, though; the only reason Barry Bonds will hit more homers than Mike Schmidt is because of the years they played in. Home runs are up 50% now over where they were during Schmidt’s career.
If Bonds leads the NL in homers this year, it’ll be his second home run title. Mike Schmidt led the league in homers EIGHT TIMES. The man was a home run machine, the greatest player of his day. Bonds and Schmidt are inner circle Hall of Famers, two of the best dozen players in the history of the game.
Well, I doubt he’ll get it, but it certainly would be nice.
Crunchy, we’re still smarting over 1987. Hey, I was nine years old and I will never get over it! Least y’all got your asses kicked by the Twins. Ha!
Seriously, I’m with Barry when he says that all that matters is the World Series. The SF Giants have never won the World Series, and it would pretty much make my lifetime if they do. They haven’t even been in the WS for twelve years, and aside from the very memorable non-baseball happenings, it was one of the lamest (and saddest, for a Giants fan) Series ever.
The best thing about Thursday’s (first) home run was that it happened in the “VISA home run inning” and some unsuspecting schmo left the ballpark $13,000 richer. I got a much bigger kick out of that than any home run race going on!
[hijack]Excuse us long-suffering Giants fans while we commiserate…Kyla, I hear ya, bud. I was 9 years old in '62, so I’ve been waiting a looooong time for a decent Series showing. '89 was the most anti-climactic sporting event in history–I don’t think the Giants ever held a lead in that series. And I can’t believe how bad we choked last year. I hate the Mets. [/hijack]
jsc, the Mets are getting their karmic payback this year. Neener neener! But yeah, I almost came to tears over the playoffs last year. Not as bad as 1993, though. I did cry on the last day of the season. I love Dusty and all, but I hope he has recurring nightmares about Solomon Torres, just so he’ll remember to never do that again!
Geez. My first post and I’m continuing a hijack, but that’s a Giants fan for you. Kyla, I luv ya for always sticking up for the Giants, but you can’t blame Dusty or Torres for that last game of 1993. When Torres left the game it was 3-1. Yes, it was the fourth inning, but it was Burba who gave up 3 runs in the fifth and Jim Deshaies and Dave Righetti (our current pitching coach) who gave up oodles of runs after that.
If you must blame somebody, blame the Giants hitters for being utterly mystified by Kevin Gross who dominated them that day, much as he would for his no-hitter a couple of years later. Blame the Rockies who could not beat the Braves once that year. 0-13, I believe. The Giants had already won the first three games of four at Chavez Ravine and they were out of gas. The only other choice to start the game was Scott Frickin Sanderson, so it wasn’t like we were holding someone back. Heck, if Bonds and Will Clark hadn’t been on monster tears earlier in that series, the Giants’ season would have been already over.
Okay, hijack over. Forgive us non-Giant fans, 103 wins and no playoffs is still hard to swallow, 8 years later. Hopefully, Bonds will continue his tear this weekend. Bobby Cox seems unafraid to challenge him, and he hits Maddux pretty well. It should be interesting.
Yes, I know. I said so later in that post, and followed up with:
“You know, maybe that wasn’t the strongest argument I could’ve made for the Cardinal fans needing this record…”
That stuff about the Cardinal fans needing the record was supposed to be tongue-in-cheek.
The good news is, although McGwire’s record may go down, the Cards are on a hot 11 game winning streak. McGwire (batting in the 6th slot for a change - it took LaRussa long enough to shuffle the slumping slugger out of the top of the order!) went 3 for 3 with 4 RBIs. No homeruns, but that’s ok, I was just glad to see him hit the ball.
And I recently added a Barry Bonds autographed baseball to my collection. Just in case…
I’d always heard about Barry Bonds being a jerk, I wasn’t ever really sure why people thought of him like that. Rick Reilly wrote a great column about Bonds this week. At first I didn’t care either way if he broke the record, now I’m rooting against him.
It could just be a case of Reilly having sour grapes for Bonds, but Reilly generally writes a good column (in my opinion) and I think the column is believeable.
Ty Cobb, by ALL accounts, was a Grade-A asshole, one of the meanest, most racist SOBs to ever play the game. (He once went into the stands to attack a heckler and did not back off even after seeing the man was a double-amputee, with no legs.) But, for decades, he held the record for the most career hits. He’s a charter member of the Hall of Fame for it. It would have been nice if a truly decent guy had held the record for so long, but that’s life. (It also would have been nice if a truly decent guy had broken the record. Anyone want a Pete Rose thread?)
For me, wondering how many HRs Bonds will hit is more curiosity than anything else. I’d be just as interested Sammy Sosa had 54 HRs now.
Interesting stuff. I follow the Giants religiously, and I have to say the most interesting thing about Reilly’s column (I already knew Bonds was a jerk, and he and Jeff Kent don’t exchange Christmas cards) was that it included more Jeff Kent quotes than 3 years’ worth of newspapers. Apparently Reilly & Kent were looking for each other.
How many will Sosa hit? The games not over and he has 3 today. That gives him 49 for the season. Watch out Barry.
Has anyone ever hit for a homerun cycle? You know, a solo
shot, a 2-run dinger, a 3-run blast and a grand slam? I ask this because I see that Sammy is 3/4 of the way there. All he needs is the grand slam.
Actually, the fan Cobb assaulted had no hands, or arms, depending on the source.
Cobb was such an all-around complete asshole, he most likely wouldn’t even be allowed to play today. (And yet, he’s in the Hall of Fame while Pete Rose is banned for the comparatively minor flaw of gambling - but that’s another thread). And aside from the hit record he held for so long, he held the stolen base record - until Lou Brock set a new one - for decades as well.
If Bonds breaks the record, good for Bonds (which I believe that’s all he cares about anyway), he’ll have more leverage when he renegotiates his contract. It may not be easy to root for him as a person, but if he can do it while batting over .300 and in the middle of a division race, then he definitely deserve it.
Bonds was given the day off, but was sent up to pinch hit in the top of the ninth in a 5-5 tie. He proceeded to hit No. 55. He may not have the playoff numbers, but he is as clutch as they come in the regular season. Oh yeah, his last pinch hit home run came in 1989 against the … Giants.
Bonds would be way up there if he was pitched to as much as Sosa. Bonds gets walked while for Sosa, for some reason, is still getting good pitches. I mean, 3 homeruns for one game? You think they would have learned something after the first or second and walked him.
Dont mind me though, I just get worked up that Bonds has so many walks when other players still get the opportunities to hit. If it wasn’t for that I would say it is a sure thing for him breaking the record.
