History In the Making

The Giants won their 3rd straight game on Friday and overcame another bad outing by their overpaid, so called ace. Nobody was talking about the win after the game though. Barry Bonds is now one home run away from claiming a share of the Major League Baseball home run record. Bonds hit a long jack in the first inning of Friday nights and then was walked 4 consecutive times after that. I think it's pretty apparent that nobody on that Florida staff wanted to be the one to give up number 755 and I don't really blame them. Barry looks locked in and focused on not just breaking the record, but trying to turn this season around a bit for the Giants. I think it's going to be very interesting to see how pitchers go about pitching Bonds now that every home run he hits' from here on out will be part of history. This is one of the most (if not the most) recognized record in all of sports and I'm sure no pitcher in the game wants to have his name in the record books as being the one who surrendered 755 or 756. The Giants have two more home games before they head down south for a six game road trip. Unless Barry hits two home runs in the next two games, he is going to be in position to break this thing on the road in Southern California.

Barry wasn't the only Giant who was in the midst of making history. Mark Sweeney passed up Manny Mota to move into second place on the all-time pinch list and just a few days ago, Omar Vizquel passed up Ozzie Smith as the leader for most games played at shortstop. You know you have an old team when records of longevity are being set left and right, but I do think some of this hype has helped ignite the team a little bit. The bats have been coming alive with Dave Roberts and Omar Vizquel finally finding their stroke a at the top of the lineup. Roberts has been the hot hand lately as he's added about 30 points onto his average over the last 10 games. The team has won 3 games and 5 out of their last 8 and they have been playing with a different energy than what they'd showed over most of the first 3 1/2 months. They don't have a realistic shot at getting back into a postseason race, and with most of the guys on this team under contract, they have 2 months left to evaluate what they will have going into next year.