Bonds closing in on milestone

Well the Sharks' streak is now over after losing a heartbreaker to Carolina 1-0 on Friday. Clay Hensley outdueled Kenny Rogers and Juan Rivera's solo home run in the fourth was the only run of the game.

Arkansas' Barry Bonds hit his 10th homer of the year in the 9-2 rout of Hoboken Saturday. It was Bonds' 598th homer of his career. Bonds will be the first player to hit 600 in his career. If you're wondering if anyone will catch him anytime soon...well that depends on your definition of "soon". Bonds has a more than 150 homer lead on second place Sammy Sosa - stuck at 436 and not even playing this year.

Newark's Jim Edmonds hit his 300th career homer Sunday. Honolulu's Jason Giambi is closing in on the mark as well, with 298. Bonds is not worried about either one.

Look for a new Zane Smith column later today.

Golden Falcon golden achievements

Arkansas' Barry Bonds became the all-time leader in career at-bats Sunday. Bonds passed Roberto Alomar on the all-time list and is now sitting comfortably in first. Since Alomar and Bagwell - the two closest behind him - are retired and Pudge Rodriguez is more than 400 ABs behind Bonds and also an oldster, he may be there for a while. If he wasn't the all-time walks leader, he might be at a 1000 by now (hmmm not to self, who are the top plate appearance leaders?). Bonds also holds the career records for home runs, hits, RBIs, and on base percentage.

Congratulations to Pedro Martinez on his 200th career win against South Boston Saturday. Martinez pitched eight innings surrendering three runs on eight hits and striking out 10 Gangsters.

Greg Maddux had a great pitching line in Sunday's game: eight innings, two hits, one unearned run allowed, no walks, seven strikeouts. Good enough for a win, right? wrong! Carolina's Clay Hensley outdueled the veteran, allowing only two hits and four walks in six innings. Two costly errors in the second inning did Vancouver in and the offense couldn't hit its way out of a wet paper bag.

Philadelphia has officially put Magglio Ordonez on the trading block. Ordonez has lost playing time to younger outfielders Reed Johnson, Vernon Wells, and Michael Cuddyer. The oft-injured star has only hit .163 in 43 at bats this season.