Getty Image / Harry How / Steve Grayson / WireImage
Barry Bonds and Greg Maddux, two of the greatest baseball players in history with completely different skillsets, were handed iPads with footage of their matchup from May 1st, 1998. It’s incredible to go inside the minds of tehse two MLB legends breaking down how they faced the best in the game.
Atlanta would go on to win this particular game 6-2 with “The Professor” giving up 2 earned runs over 7 frames with 4 strikeouts. I don’t want to give away everything in the clip though, spoiler alert, Barry Bonds matched Greg Maddux’s performance as the two stars showed up for the fans that day.
Greg Maddux saying the 1st Inning was too early to pitch around someone is interesting because a few short years later as Barry Bonds was chasing the home run record pitchers had zero qualms pitching around him. Bonds was intentionally walked 120 times (!!!) in 2004, an MLB record. Over his career, Bonds hit .262 with 8 HRs against Maddux in 154 plate appearances. In the year of this matchup, Maddux had a 2.22 ERA over the season with a 0.980 WHIP.
Of the 20,421 batters that Greg Maddux faced in his entire career, only 153 were intentionally walked according to Evan Thompson who did a ‘MythBusters’ dive on a popular meme about Maddux’s career facing 3-0 counts.
Maddux aka “The Professor” was playing chess while 99% of MLB players were playing checkers. That’s the reality of it. But Barry Bonds was NOT a normal hitter. Maddux called him “the best in baseball” in this clip and that speaks volumes.
I came across this clip over the weekend, actually seeing it on TikTok first but here is the Instagram version. It shows just how deep Greg Maddux was thinking when he faced hitters like Barry Bonds and other All Stars. In this instance, Maddux was thinking literal months ahead of this matchup and then, months later, his plan came to fruition:
It would be amazing to hear from current Major Leaguers on if there are any pitchers in baseball right now that operate on the level of Greg Maddux or if there are any hitters with the mindset of a guy like Barry Bonds. The simple answer is ‘no’ but I’m sure there are some incredible stories to be told with the modern players.