A Historic Home Run, Plus One

Only three years after Mark McGwire of the St. Louis Cardinals lifted baseball’s home run record to a height thought insurmountable, Barry Bonds surpassed it Friday night, doing it in convincing fashion against a hated rival.

In the opener of a season-concluding, three-game series with the Los Angeles Dodgers, the San Francisco Giant slugger broke a tie with McGwire by hitting his 71st and 72nd home runs in his first two at-bats. Dodger pitchers have not been strangers to historic home runs over the years, and this time it was Chan Ho Park who was victimized by Bonds as a Pacific Bell Park crowd saluted each of Bonds’ blasts with prolonged ovations.

The 37-year-old left fielder, enjoying a remarkable season at an age when most players are in retirement or considering it, had tied McGwire when he hit his 70th home run in his final at-bat at Houston’s Enron Field on Thursday night.

Amid Friday’s anticipation, before a capacity crowd of 41,730 and more than 200 reporters from across the country, Bonds responded by slugging Park’s second pitch to him in the first inning over the fence in right-center field, a distance of 442 feet.

Bonds raised his right arm exultantly as he rounded first base and was mobbed by teammates and embraced by his son, Nikolai, 9, when he reached the plate.

Two banners, one reading “Bonds” and the other “71,” were raised on each side of the center field scoreboard as Bonds first received a congratulatory call from his father, former major leaguer Bobby Bonds, and then trotted to a photo box behind the plate and hugged his wife, Liz, and mother, Pat.

The crowd twice summoned Bonds from the dugout for curtain calls, and that scene was still vivid when he connected again in the third inning, driving Park’s 1-and-1 pitch into the center-field bleachers for the 566th homer of his career, putting him seventh on the all-time list.

There had been some speculation that the Dodgers would follow the example of most other teams recently and pitch cautiously to him, but Park went after him at each of those first two at-bats before walking him intentionally in the fourth inning when the score and situation required it.

Bonds walked eight times in three games in Houston and 20 times in his last nine games. He also had broken Babe Ruth’s 1923 record of 170 walks in a season, coming in Friday night with 175, which made his home run record that much more impressive.

“I’ve played with and been around a lot of great players, but I’ve never seen a player maintain his focus and concentration to the extent that Barry has this season,” San Francisco Manager Dusty Baker said before the game.

Bonds had to summon that concentration again after attending a funeral Friday for a close friend and bodyguard, Franklin Bradley.

Although the home run record is one of the most hallowed in sports, there are many in baseball who feel that the offensive explosion of recent years has diminished the significance and that Bonds, who had a career high of 49 last year, is merely an extension of the trend. Theorists say that smaller ballparks, stronger athletes, expansion-thinned pitching and livelier baseballs have contributed to the increase in scoring and home runs.

Until 1995, major league players had hit 50 or more home runs in a season only 18 times in about 100 years. In the last seven seasons, it has been done 16 times. This year, Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs became the first player in major league history to hit 60 or more homers in three seasons.

Although his home run pursuit took prominence in the series opener with the Dodgers, there was a dual story line in that a San Francisco loss would eliminate the Giants from both the NL West division race and the league’s wild card race. The Dodgers led 11-10 in the seventh inning at the time this edition of The Times went to press.

After intentionally walking Bonds in the fourth inning, ending his streak of home runs in three consecutive at-bats, the Dodgers watched Jeff Kent follow with a bases-loaded double that reduced a Dodger lead to 9-8. Bonds flied out to left in his fourth at-bat.

By that time, of course, Bonds was in the record book and so was Park--for the second time. In 1999, the Dodger right-hander allowed two bases-loaded homers to Fernando Tatis of St. Louis within the same inning, an unprecedented accomplishment by Tatis and one of many milestone moments in which Dodger pitchers have been involved. Al Downing gave up Henry Aaron’s 715th home run in 1974, breaking Ruth’s career record for homers; three Dodger pitchers yielded home runs to Yankee Reggie Jackson in the memorable World Series game in 1977; Terry Forster allowed a home run to Joe Morgan of the Giants on the final day of the 1982 season, costing the Dodgers a pennant; Tom Niedenfuer was rocked for a famous home run by Jack Clark in 1985 that cost the Dodgers a playoff with the Cardinals; and, of course, almost 50 years to the day Friday, Ralph Branca gave up the “shot heard round the world” when Bobby Thomson slugged his dramatic home run to give the Giants the 1951 pennant.

The Dodgers and Giants were back at it Friday night, and so was Barry Bonds.