Barry Bonds and His Intentional Walks Records

When it comes to intentional walks, when a batter is purposely walked so that he cannot hit the ball, Barry Bonds of the San Francisco Giants is the king. Bonds has more intentional walks in his career than the next two men on the list combined, and Bonds has been issued more intentional walks in one season, 2004, than the vast majority of men to play Major League Baseball have had in their entire careers. Bonds dominates every intentional walk statistic there is, whether it is lifetime total, single season, most in a game, or most in one month.

Baseball did not keep track of intentional walks until 1955, so it is impossible to know how many that sluggers like Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, or Mel Ott accumulated in their lives. Ott was once walked on purpose with the bases loaded in 1929, so feared was he, as was Bonds in 1998. The first leader in intentional walks in baseball annals was the Reds' Ted Kluszewski, who was given 25, compared to the 17 that Ted William s received that 1955 season. Williams held the record of 33 until it was broken by the Giants' Willie McCovey, who clung to that mark for 33 years until his standard of 45 was surpassed by Bonds in 2002, the year he was the recipient of 68 intentional walks.

As Bonds began to decimate National League pitching, he kept getting walked over and over intentionally whenever he was in position to do damage to opposing hurlers. In 1999 Bonds went by Hank Aaron on the career intentional walks roster, a spot Aaron had occupied for some 23 years with 293. Bonds went by and didn't just break the record, he obliterated it. Bonds now has been walked intentionally 688 different times in his almost 22 full seasons; Aaron with 293 and McCovey with 260 total 553 together. Bonds is less than one hundred free passes behind the next three men behind him on the career list, as when you add in the 230 walks of the number four batter, Ken Griffey Jr., to Aaron and McCovey's sum, you have 783 intentional walks. Even at the age of 42, Bonds has gotten walked 43 times on purpose in 2007, so there's a great chance that if he plays another season, he will go by the 800 plateau with ease.

In terms of single seasons with the most intentional walks, Bonds owns the top three campaigns ever, five of the first six on the list, eight of the first dozen, and eleven of the top twenty. McCovey is at fourth place with his 45 in 1969 and in seventh with the 40 intentional walks he was given the very next year. The Phillies' home run threat, Ryan Howard, and Sammy Sosa are tied for ninth all-time with 37 in one season. Among the players still active, only three have ever been given more than two hundred intentional walks- Bonds, Griffey, and Vladimir Guerrero, who has 222. To show how ridiculous the totals that Bonds has are, he has more intentional walks in his 2004 season than all but twelve men still playing have in their careers.

In his 2004 season, Bonds was once walked intentionally four times in one contest, which is the single game record. That April, he was walked intentionally 22 times, and he broke his won career record of 68 in one season on July 10th, even before the All-Star Break. That year, Bonds was walked an amazing 232 times, breaking another mark that was his own, the 198 he had in 2002. Bonds now sits all alone on the career walks list, with his 2,558 far outdistancing Rickey Henderson's 2,190.