By Carol-Ann Rudy
TicketNews.com
After a successful All-Stars game played at the Giants’ AT&T park last Tuesday, July 10, Bonds and the team rested Wednesday and Thursday before playing the Los Angeles Dodgers Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at home, which the Dodgers won handily.
His last home run, number 751, was off Cincinnati’s Aaron Harang at Cincinnati on July 3. To date, Bonds has hit 17 home runs and is one away from beating the record of 18 home runs set by Carlton Fisk in 1991 based on a player who turned 43 or greater during the season. Even if he can’t match last season’s 26 home runs, he needs just 4 more to match, and 5 to break Aaron’s home run career record. That’s very likely to happen this summer, even though his home runs are getting further and further apart.
Our latest prediction based on Bonds’ performance is now August 5 against the San Diego Padres in an away game to tie, and August 11 against the Pittsburgh Pirates in an at-home game to break the record. . .
Scouring articles on the Internet, it seems many writers are poised to write off Bonds as being too old, too sore, and too down to do much more than match Aaron’s career home run record. But when has Bonds run true to expectations? The same naysayers were at it last year and early this season too. Yes, he has taken a few more days off to rest those knees, but has yet to be on the Disabled List and to hear him tell it, he never will be.
Has his current crop of home runs been influenced by steroids? If indeed he ever actually took them—keeping in mind that he never tested positive and never admitted to ingesting them—then it has been some time since there would have been any influence on his performance. Let’s consider that he is truly talented, as his record shows. Bonds may well have a few more surprises in store for us.