Barry Bonds, you’re up.
Now that Alex Rodriguez has finally reached his milestone – becoming the youngest hitter to reach 500 home runs – baseball’s focus is squarely on the San Francisco slugger and his next homer.
Bonds, who hasn’t homered in a week, was one home run shy of tying Hank Aaron’s record going into the Giants’ game at San Diego on Saturday night.
Rodriguez had gone since July 25 without a home run, but he took care of business early, hitting the first pitch he saw from Kansas City’s Kyle Davies just past the foul pole in left field.
The homer came eight days after he celebrated his 32nd birthday. Rodriguez surpassed Jimmie Foxx (32 years, 338 days) as the youngest player to reach 500. A-Rod is the 22nd player to reach the mark, the second this season behind Frank Thomas.
Bonds is in his 22nd season while Rodriguez is in his 14th, meaning it’s entirely possible that A-Rod could one day take over as baseball’s home run king.
On Saturday night, Bonds was set to face Clay Hensley of the Padres. Bonds is 2-for-11 (.182) with five walks in his career against the right-hander, who was to make his first big league start since May 2.
In three relief appearances since being recalled on July 25, Hensley has allowed a run and three hits in 6 1-3 innings.
When A-Rod went deep on Saturday, he stood at home plate for a second, waiting to see if the ball would stay fair. When it did, he threw his hands in the air and began trotting around the bases with a wide grin on his face as cheers from rained down from the Yankee Stadium seats.
When Rodriguez reached the plate, he hugged Derek Jeter and Bobby Abreu, who both scored on the landmark home run. His teammates were already on the field and A-Rod embraced several of them on his way to the dugout.
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