Word: ruth
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Baseball's stat packers have called his 2001 season one of the best ever. At 37, Bonds hit 73 home runs, breaking Mark McGwire's record. Not only did Bonds hit more dingers, he needed 33 fewer at bats to do it. And he walked 177 times, breaking Babe Ruth's record for perambulation...
...performance even more remarkable. He's a great fielder too, with eight Gold Gloves to go along with a record four (and soon to be five) Most Valuable Player awards. By some measures, Bonds has surpassed his godfather, Willie Mays, and ranks as the second best player ever, behind Ruth...
...that pairing lies a point. Ruth, the Sultan of Swat, owned baseball's record books and mythology for 50 years after his career ended. The legend was of a hardscrabble son of a saloonkeeper with a big heart who loved kids and was worshipped by his fans. Ruth was all of that, but he also set prodigious marks in beer guzzling and womanizing...
Bonds, on the other hand, suffers the rap as the dark star of baseball's universe, a sullen, selfish man unloved by his teammates. Unlike Ruth, he has no adoring press and has never tried to craft a nice-guy public persona the way media masters like Michael Jordan have done. Bonds' dyspeptic relationship with reporters--he doesn't trust them, fancy that--has sent them digging for dirt...
...flap over Bad Barry shouldn't overshadow the fact that we are watching one of the greatest players the game has ever produced. Like Ruth, Bonds has changed the sport. Before Ruth, the name of the game was "scientific" baseball, a singles strategy designed to move runners from station to station to create a run. With his mighty uppercut, the Bambino ended that style forever and made power primary to winning...