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Gary B.It's perhaps easier to be impressed by Ichiro since he hasn't broken the records Bonds has, even though hitting 200 your first four seasons for the first time ever is damn impressive, whether he beats Sisler or not, but I'm hoping he does beat it. I love to see records broken, especially ones that have lasted for decades by the true greats of the game. If you're into statistics as I am, then it's just a wild ride every day.
It's perhaps easy to take Bonds' numbers for granted, since for the most part, all the records he's breaking this year are his own, but that doesn't make them less impressive, it just puts someone else ever matching it even further out of reach. This season alone he's already become the first person to get 100 intentional walks, is just about to be the first person ever to get over 200 walks, and unless something drastic changes, he'll be the first person ever to get over a .600 on base percentage - that is just insane. He's also about to post the 4th season ever with an .800+ slugging percentage (to make it 2 seasons for Ruth and 2 for Bonds), an OPS of 1.434 (highest ever beating his own record), not to mention he's hitting around .370, will get around 45 home runs and less than 40 strikeouts with only approx. 375 at bats by the time the season's over for a 40-year old man who will undoubtedly get his 7th MVP including his 4th straight. This is impressive s**t, and this is only this one year, not even mentioning the crazy records of other individual years and the career numbers he's adding to.
Add Ichiro into the mix, and things get damn exciting. With him you don't even have a pennant race getting in the way, it's all about what he does or does not do each day.
Here's hoping Maddux gets 2 more to get to 15 wins, extending his streak to an unbelievable 17 years! While no one will ever approach the 370+ win mark of the 4 winningest pitchers ever, still no one has created this amazing feat of consistency, not even the great one they named that award after.
Add to that all the tight division and wild card races, and well, what can one say but what a season! Gotta love baseball in September...