Congrats to Barry Bonds...
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overseascardfan
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The man deserves credit. Juice or not it is hard to hit a HR period. There are some big guys in MLB that aren't known as HR hitters because you need power and skill. The most amazing part is that Bonds has accomplished this feat while being in the public's eye and has faced a large amount of criticism and anomosity. Not only is the guy a terrific hitter, he is also known as a great all around player. Attitude wise everyone would pretty much agree he is jerk but you have to give him credit and respect. Good luck to A-Rod as he will be the next HR king barring injuries.
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Yep and last night he got 4 hittable pitches in the whole game and had 2 hits, a just missed foul back, and then the HR. He's an amazing hitter, when you consider the era with the specialization of pitchers it's impossible to compare him to Aaron(pitching handled differently) and don't even try to compare to Ruth when complete games were common and you often got to hit off tired pitchers. Ruth played years in a ballpark with a short right field porch built for him, Aaron played years in the launching pad in Atlanta, Barry plays in one of the toughest HR parks in baseball.
I got to thinking last night what if A Rod opts out and decides to sign with say Cincy or Colorado and play in a really HR friendly park? Would people completely discount his HR totals because he chose to pick a park like that?
I am still not happy that Bonds used steroids but I do give him his due he's the best player of his era and among the best of any era.
That is a really good topic. Would you agree that people generally discount Todd Helton and Larry Walker's offensive prowess?
Using baseball-reference.com's HR stats and "Similar to" comparison;
Code:
Home Road Home% Road%
Helton 182 115 61.2 38.7
Guererro 190 166 53.3 46.7
Giambi 178 179 49.9 50.1I think the posters here questioning Ruth's greatness are simply hilarious! Babe held the postseason career ERA record for about forty years! He had a World Series consecutive scoreless innings streak of 29 2/3 innings. Not to mention that his overall career ERA is 2.48. Now you can't have it both ways and say that he took advantage of tired pitchers to inflate his stats when his stats were as good as they were as a pitcher. If he had never given up pitching, I'm convinced he'd have been one of the two or three greatest pitchers to ever play the game.
He's also the ninth-best hitter for career average ever. He hit more home runs than any other TEAM in baseball some years. He hit his HRs in 2/3 the number of AB as Aaron. Also, prior to 1931, umpires could rule a home run foul if it the ball came to a rest in foul territory. In other words, homers that wrapped around (or hit) the foul pole were not counted as home runs if they did not remain in fair territory. Bill Jenkinson suggests Ruth would have hit over 100 HRs in 1921were modern rules in effect when he played.
Ruth was an athletic freak the likes of which will probably never be seen again. Everybody remembers the fat Ruth, but look at pictures of the young Ruth. He looks like he's made of granite! He utterly dominated his contemporaries statistically and in wins/losses. He's the greatest player ever, and it's really not close, IMO.
He's also the ninth-best hitter for career average ever. He hit more home runs than any other TEAM in baseball some years. He hit his HRs in 2/3 the number of AB as Aaron. Also, prior to 1931, umpires could rule a home run foul if it the ball came to a rest in foul territory. In other words, homers that wrapped around (or hit) the foul pole were not counted as home runs if they did not remain in fair territory. Bill Jenkinson suggests Ruth would have hit over 100 HRs in 1921were modern rules in effect when he played.
Ruth was an athletic freak the likes of which will probably never be seen again. Everybody remembers the fat Ruth, but look at pictures of the young Ruth. He looks like he's made of granite! He utterly dominated his contemporaries statistically and in wins/losses. He's the greatest player ever, and it's really not close, IMO.
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It drove Ty Cobb nearly nuts that Ruth was that good.
I am thinking that, overall, the stadiums were far bigger when Ruth played, and the baseball was wound as tight since Bonds played during the Home Run Derby era. But I can't say for sure.
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I'm not saying that he wasn't great. I'm just saying he was a coke head. If you want to bag on Bonds for taking illegal substances, you'd better be prepared to do the same with Babe.
Considering that over 500 hundred of them came in other parks I would have to say no. HE has proven himself. Health assured he will pass Barry unless he pulls a BArry Sanders IMO.
So Darryl Strawberry should have 1000 home runs?
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Yep and the kid they have now Holliday or whatever(I don't follow baseball closely anymore), I completely discount his stats because of the park.
Who knows what a great hitter like A Rod could do in that park?
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I'm not discounting his stats, they said on ESPN the HR record was in the 130's before Ruth put it up to 714. he dominated his era unlike anybody ever has in any sport.
What I'm saying is that in his era there were several factors that make it impossible to compare. Baseball wasn't integrated, and the game was completely different. Today it's quite common to face the starter twice, the middle reliever, the setup man, and the closer. That's 5 AB's where in 4 of those at bats you're facing a guy who's "fresh".
In Ruth's era that was just not done, you'd routinely get 4-5 AB's against the same pitcher. So you not only got the tired factor, you got to see him 4-5 times to get "dialed in."
OBviously Ruth was demonstrably better than anybody else in his era and I believe he'd have been great in any era(modern training etc). But when you look at the high batting averages over history it's not coincidence that they taper down over time. There were HUGE changes to the game both in handling of pitchers, and integration which massively increased the talent pool.
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No, he couldn't handle the coke like Babe could.
DWKB
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619 HR
So Ruth was the only guy in his era who benefited from this? Why were his stats so much better than everyone else he played with? Why did he have so much success against the man many consider the greatest pitcher ever (Walter Johnson)? And, of course, Ruth had no problems putting up monster statistics as a pitcher himself (he pitched a 14-inning 2-1 complete game victory in the 1916 world series).
Over time, facts can reach mythical status in many cases. In Ruth's case, despite the awesome numbers he put up, time has caused us to somewhat forget how truly incredible he was.
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You arent kidding. 59 of his 88 HRs have come at Coors. That's 67%.
I did a quick google and the first number I got was from an old sabr study from 95-96(no idea why that old) that said Coors field elevated offense by roughly 68% so the effect on Colorado hitters was a 34% improvement(since they play half their games there a year).
So you take a typical A Rod year and multiply that out. I gave him 50 HR this year as a guesstimate where he ends up, that puts his 4 years as a Yankee averaging just over 42 HR a year(42.25). if the 34% number is correct that increases his HR total by 14 and he's suddenly averaging 56 HR a year!
Again the Coors number is old, I don't follow baseball closely at all anymore and I think they may have made some changes that have slightly changed the inflation, but a hitter like that in that park would just be impossible.
You look at what he did his last few years in Texas and you can see Yankee stadium has deflated his stats, he went from averaging in the low 50's to low 40's when he changed teams.
Personally, I have no problem with Barry doing steroids, HGH, or whatever else he wants to pump into his own body. Baseball didn't restrict or test for those substances, so he was doing whatever it took to get ahead of the competition. Good for him. And before any of you go on about how steroids are illegal, save it. Just because something is illegal doesn't make it wrong, and just because something is legal doesn't make it morally correct. I'm in favor of legalization of any and all substances. What a person wants to put into his own body is his business, not mine or the government's.
Steroids are not some magic pill that makes you hit HRs. A person still has to put in the work in the weight room to see any benefit. Bonds did the work and he deserves his record. He's still a miserable human being, though.
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Barry is a juicer, but the real reason why no one respects, likes, or cares for him as a human being or the fact that he broke the record is that he is a first class a-hole, plain and simple. The funniest part of the night was my wife (doesn't follow baseball) asking me as Upton was batting in the 9th, "will they stop the game and shooot off fireworks if Upton gets the cycle?" I thought the whole Bonds ceremony seemed super cheesy, and everything was fake from the Aaron video to Bonds's emotional (or lack thereof) speech. Big difference between this and when McGwire passed Maris, although in retrospect that was BS too.
When I watched the tape of BB running the bases for 756 I chuckled to myself that he was not going to be able to touch Rickey Henderson's speech that RH made when he broke the stolen base record.
"Today, I am the greatest of all time!"
That is just awesome.
"Today, I am the greatest of all time!"
That is just awesome.
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They are certainly part of the magic formula though. Notice Barry's (and several other juicers) phenominal jump in HR's after steroid use (right about the time he went from having a thin and athletic body frame to a massive body frame complete with melon head expansion).
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spikecop02
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It is me or did he kinda ignore is son after the homerun last night, his son what right at home plate and seemed he kinda shuned him, or was that just me?
