CON GAMES: Booing Barry Bonds

April 24th, 2007 at 08:46am Michael Conniff 2

SAN FRANCISCO--I take this idea of booing a sports god with more seriousness than usual here by the Bay because of what my Daddy’s mommy told my Daddy a long time ago: “Never put it in writing, son. They’ll only hold it against you.”

Amen, Grandma, may you rest, but you never stopped my Daddy from writing and writing and writing some more. In all, in a life with millions of words, Frank Conniff wrote exactly one sentence that survived him: “What a town. They cheer Khrushchev and boo Willie Mays.”

The town, needless to say, was San Francisco, and my Father came by the line honestly. He had covered Khrushchev in Russia in 1955, and he had watched not long after when his beloved New York Giants kissed the Polo Grounds goodbye and hit the road for the city by the Bay. He loved Willie Mays beyond all reason, and truth be told he was in said Polo Grounds the day the Say Hey Kid made his famous over-the-head catch in deep center against the Cleveland Indians in Game One of the World Series.

He loved the New York Giants, and he did his best to love the San Francisco Giants, and at worst his love for Willie Mays is now shared by just about everyone who tickles the turnstiles here at AT&T (nee Pacific Bell) Park.

There is a Willie Mays statue and a Willie Mays plaza at the front of the ballpark and Willie Mays specialty sausages inside and his #24 is everywhere you look. Without Willie Mays the Giants would be midgets.

His godson, Barry Bonds, wears #25, just a notch up in tribute, and his godfather played ball with his father, Bobby Bonds. The Mays-Bonds connection is unmistakable and unbreakable, but there’s a problem in paradise: Willie Mays never took steroids or human growth hormone or anything that could be remotely considered cheating.

When we walked into the park for the Sunday game against the Arizona Diamondbacks—they seemed like the lowly Arizona Diamondbacks to me—the setting and the day were perfection personified: sun, silliness, ballpark food, and the foghorn who hated everybody right behind us. The 2007 All-Star Game will be here this summer, in a park not more than a few years old, and baseball in its timeless agrarian glory will be on display in these confusing modern times.

Barry Bonds walked into the ballpark with 739 taters in his sack, with just another 16 to go before he catches Hank Aaron for the top spot on the list with 755. We were there to see a new ballpark, of course—and to place a check on that long list—but also to see a god, albeit one who needed the help of man to climb Olympus.

I booed during his first at bat but my heart wasn't in it because of the love all around me for their hero. And Barry Bonds did not disappoint. He walked to his position in left with indifference—playing the field is an annoyance—but in his second at-bat he rifled a shot just over the high old-timey brick wall in right.

We were hoping for a water shot over the park and into the Bay, there for the kayakers to battle and paddle their way to a bobbing shot of immortality. But no matter. We got what we came for—#740—and then the god was caught looking in the eighth before the manager pulled him from the game.

My Father would be more than happy to hear the Giants won 2-1 on a nifty 3-hitter by Matt Cain, but I wish I could have walked from the park loving Barry Bonds all the more, instead of bemoaning the taint on a god that failed.

Entry Filed under: Sports, Con Games, Travel, Family, Stars