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In his 20th pro season, Barry Bonds led the National League with a .362 average. (Jeff Chiu/AP)
SAN FRANCISCO – Barry Bonds long ago staked his claim as one of the greatest ballplayers in history, and at times the Giants slugger seemingly can only top himself for Major League honors.
He did it again on Monday, capturing his unprecedented fourth consecutive National League Most Valuable Player Award and seventh overall, records only the 40-year-old veteran can boast. Bonds received 24 of 32 first-place votes, seven second-place votes and one third-place vote. Finishing second was Adrian Beltre of Los Angeles, followed by Albert Pujols, Scott Rolen and Jim Edmonds of the National League champion St. Louis Cardinals.
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Bonds is absolutely ridiculous - i mean my godness - 4 straight MVP awards - Albert Pujlos wishes he play in the american league!
a lot of it had to do with the fact that Bonds had a .609 on-base percentage, and had 120 intentional walks… not to mention the fact that he is the first player in 24 years to have more homers than strikeouts in a season, won the batting title, etc etc…
Let’s just put some of those numbers into perspective.
A .609 on-base percentage was the best in major league history - he also holds the 2nd highest on-base percentage in a season, .582 - In fact, the record for every major leaguer aside from Barry Bonds is .553, by Ted Williams. - the only 20th century major leaguers to have even a .500 on-base percentage are Barry Bonds (4 times), Babe Ruth (5 times), Ted Williams (2 times), Mickey Mantle (once), and Rogers Hornsby (once) - Notable hitters never to have a .500 on-base percentage include Ty Cobb, Tris Speaker, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Joe Jackson, and every other 20th century hitter ever.
120 intentional walks is not only the highest total in a season; its nearly twice the number of intentional walks as any other season in major league history - the second and third highest totals are 68 and 61, set by… Barry Bonds in 2002, and… Barry Bonds in 2003 - Willie McCovey still holds the record for every other major league player in history, at 45 (interesting piece of Giants trivia… Bonds and McCovey hold 8 of the top 9 places on the IBB list, with Sosa 2001 holding the other).
Bonds now has 604 intentional walks in his career, literally more than twice the amount of any other player in major league history - Henry Aaron and Willie McCovey, the holders of the 2nd and 3rd places on the all-time list, combined for 553 in their careers (another interesting piece of trivia… #44 has been great for power hitters - Reggie Jackson, Aaron, and McCovey all wore that number, and combined for 1839 home runs just between them)…hmmmm
Bonds had 45 homers in 2004 with only 41 strikeouts - the last time anyone had more home runs than strikeouts was 1980 when George Brett hit 24 homers and struck out 22 times - the last time anyone hit as many as 40 homers and had more homers than strikeouts was 1955 by Ted Kluzewski.
I mean the figures just go on and on… when somebody has a season like this you kind of have to just throw those conventional arguments out the window - it would have looked pretty silly 50 years from now if people looked back at the 2004 season - and saw that Adrian Beltre won the award because his team won 2 more games, or that Pujols won it because he was “robbed last year” or whatever.
And to anyone who uses the steroids thing…if he is, then so are the pitchers, the catchers, everyone else is on it…so it puts it back to a level playing field…It takes more than steroids to hit the ball the way Bonds does…
But anyways…Congratulations Bonds…really there was no competition!
