Thome the third into 500-club

Jim Thome smacked the 500th home run of his career last week in a 4-2 win at home over Sardine City, becoming the third player in league history to reach 500. The historic bomb came off of Phil Hughes, leading off the second inning. With Monday's home runs, he now has 502.

Thome joins the all-time home run leader, Barry Bonds, and Alex Rodriguez as the only members of the 500-home run club. Bond is first with 689 homers, followed by A-Rod, who enters Thursday's games with 551 dingers.

The exclusive club could get another member before the seasons is over, as Marietta's Manny Ramirez enters Thursday's action third all-time with 493 home runs. He also is among the league's all-time leaders in RBI, runs scored, strikeouts, walks, on-base percentage, slugging percentage and games played.

A first basemen who's seen time exclusively at designated hitter with Arkansas this year, Thome adds to his Hall of Fame resume. Thome's best DMBL years were spent with the juggernaut Sugar Bears, his lone Mitchell Award coming in 2003, interrupting what could have been a four-year streak of Mitchell Awards for Bonds.

Thome has enjoyed a resurgence this year, now with 25 home runs, his most since he hit 37 in 2008 with Las Vegas. He spent parts of the past three seasons in Las Vegas, Newark and Arkansas. He came up with Newark in 1996, hitting 21 home runs, before reeling off 11 straight seasons of at least 32 home runs (well, almost -- the streak was interrupted when he missed the entire 2006 season due to injury), including 65 in his Mitchell Award season of 2003, to go with a career-high 154 RBIs.