The home run king came to town last night, and he couldn’t even get the big room at RFK Stadium.
Barry Bonds and his San Francisco Giants were supposed to have special accommodations at RFK for their three-game series against the Washington Nationals. Reportedly, arrangements were made for them to use the far more spacious D.C. United clubhouse instead of the usual cramped visitor’s clubhouse.
After all, we are talking about the man who now holds “the most cherished record in baseball,” as baseball commissioner Cadillac Bud Selig called the career home run record — at least as long as Hank Aaron held it. The “cherish” may be a little tarnished these days.
Perhaps “worthless” would be a better description.
What is the home run record worth now? What does it mean? Bonds, who has been radioactive, endorsement-wise, because of the steroid controversy that now defines him, isn’t quite sure what to make of it.
When asked to reflect on breaking Aaron’s record, Bonds said, “There’s no time. I haven’t had time. There’s no time to really reflect on anything. If I could sit home for three or four days, then I could reminiscence and go, ‘[Expletive] something just happened here.’ I mean the next day, you’re back at work. Baseball is every day. Every day there is a new challenge.”
He could have spent some time last night reflecting on it. Bonds was not in the starting lineup — not that there was a record-breaking crowd on hand to greet him, anyway. George F. Will was in the house, maybe to check Bonds’ shoe size, though I didn’t see him carrying a Brannock device.
(Explanation: Will wrote a Newsweek column in May that pointed out Mike Murphy, equipment manager of the San Francisco Giants, testified in the BALCO investigation that Bonds’ baseball shoe size changed from 10½ to 13 since 1993. A Brannock device is the remarkable piece of metal invented by Charles Brannock that has measured shoe sizes since 1927).
Breaking Aaron’s record may have been worth more to the Nationals — the team that was on the field in San Francisco on Aug. 7 when Bonds hit number 756 — than it has been for Bonds. Though, even in the moment, Nationals manager Manny Acta didn’t quite grasp the magnitude of what he has witnessed — or at least the value of it.
Acta had a hand in what should be a valuable souvenir from that game — his lineup card. He almost threw it away. Clubhouse manager Mike Wallace saved it.
“I’m not a big collector,” Acta said. “I am glad that Wally brought that up to me. It was going right in the trash can, and Wally said. ‘Do you want me to keep that for you?’ I was like, ‘Oh, OK, Barry Bonds just broke the record.’ I have the lineup card from my first game, and now I’ll have this one, but I’m not a big collector.”
The Nationals are, though. Wallace said he made sure Acta’s lineup card was not only saved but also authenticated. Wallace also made sure the lineup cards posted in the dugout were saved and authenticated as well, and some other memorabilia from that historic game — including tickets for the game that Nationals players had left for themselves in anticipation of the possibility that history might be made while they were in San Francisco.
“You are not part of many events like that,” Wallace said.
But what kind of event was it, exactly? Acta said it is something he will always look back on as a special moment. “That will probably be among the greatest moments I have been part of in baseball,” he said. “When I look back years from now, it will matter. You can’t ignore it.”
America is doing its best to try, though.
Some of that is it became Michael Vick’s turn in the crossfire. But much of the indifference could be because, as Wallace said, it was an “event,” and the event is over. Maybe Bonds is right. There may be no reason to reflect because there may be nothing worthy to reflect on.
However, I anticipate we’ll all be reflecting real soon, when it becomes Barry Bonds’ turn again in the crossfire. Is a jury lineup card worth more than a baseball lineup card?
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