Bonds’ 745 homers closing in on Aaron’s 755

By: Larry Fitzgerald
Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder
Originally posted 05/17/2007

Maybe the greatest record in the history of sports, the Major League Baseball career homerun mark of 755 by Henry Aaron has long been recognized as the single greatest achievement in baseball. Before Aaron, it belonged to the immortal Babe Ruth with 714.

Ruth played during a time that most Whites don’t like to talk about. Black players were not permitted to play with Whites before 1946; supposedly, Black players were not good enough.

Jackie Robinson, as great as he was and given all that he achieved, was not the best Black player. There were at least 30 to 40 Black players like Josh Gibson, for example, who were as good or better in the Negro Leagues and never played in the big leagues. Robinson was, however, the best to get the opportunity.

Nobody questions Ruth’s achievements during that time of exclusion of Black players in that racist era. I do. It really makes you question how good all those lily-White players were who Ruth hit all those homeruns against.

Some guy, Bill Jenkinson, even wrote a book (The Year Babe Ruth Hit 104 Homeruns) recognizing Babe Ruth as baseball’s greatest slugger,claiming that in 1921, while innocent Black men were being hung up on trees across the USA like Christmas lights, Ruth would have hit 104 homeruns that year if you took into account that the dimensions of ballparks back.

Ruth in his day played in ballparks that were much larger then. Ruth hit homeruns in every ballpark that year, 59 in total, and so many of his long fly-ball outs would have been homeruns today in the smaller ballparks in which Aaron and Bonds hit theirs.

Since Jenkinson made his point while clearly ignoring the social implications of that era, I thought it was my duty to make a point about what was most important, bloodshed or length of homeruns.

Aaron has made it clear that he will not be there when Bonds passes his record. That to me clearly paints Aaron as being bitter, and it says something about Blacks, also. It says that we don’t recognize our own, that despite our disagreements we can’t work with one another. If the light is not shining on me (Aaron), then who cares? I thought Aaron was a bigger man given all the crap he had to put up with passing Ruth! And then, when another great player, Bonds, is about to take the torch, he won’t be there? That’s sad; in a small way, it speaks to why we as people can’t get it together. We keep fighting ourselves.

Consider this: The first Black player was Jackie Robinson in 1946. The all-time Major League homerun list has six Black players in the top 11. Blacks could not play until 1946, and now, in 2007, Aaron is number one with 755; number two is Barry Bonds with 745; number three is Babe Ruth with 714, and number four is Willie Mays with 660. So, three of the top four all-time are Black men.


I think Major League Baseball should recognize that they have made many mistakes that have affected history, and Bonds deserves the same consideration for his achievement that Ruth received. Aaron may have the record, but he never got the recognition.


Things were never fair and equal; as far as that goes, nothing has changed today.