From time to time the news cycle offers up an event of such import and complexity that it can only be comprehended through the medium of musical theater. This week resident composer Ben Greenman takes a look at Barry Bonds, who hit a record 756th home run last night.

[Commissioner of baseball BUD SELIG is talking to HANK AARON, as he does every day]

BUD SELIG

How's it hanging, Hammer?
No, I'm not happy either
I'm tired of this home run chase
I think I need a breather

The whole thing makes me nervous, Hank
I know it's not about popularity
But I worry I'll do a disservice
To history or to posterity

I know this should feel like the end
Of the most exhausting inning
Instead I'm filled with the suspicion
That it's just the beginning

As for me, emotionally
It fills my heart with sorrow
Oh, no...yeah...I understand
I'll talk to you tomorrow

[BUD SELIG replaces the receiver on the cradle. Before he hangs up, the audience hears, faintly but clearly, that he has in fact been calling MoviePhone. Fade out.]

[Fade in. A locker room. Men in towels walk in formation around BARRY BONDS, who is standing in the center, speaking to them.]

REPORTER #1

Your hitting game improved with age
You seem susceptible to rage
You've hit home runs with lazy swings
So how do you explain these things?

REPORTER #2

You have high levels of aggression
And disrespect for the profession
Also, people find you scary
'Cause you're cut like a topiary

REPORTER #3

You might be a convicted felon

REPORTER #4

Your head looks like a giant melon

REPORTER #5

Roger Maris's hair fell out
As he pursued the record
Your recent career has been checkered
Are you also filled with fear and doubt?

BARRY BONDS

Has this home run chase been a pressure source?
I think you need a refresher course
In what I'm trying to achieve
Your questions annoy me
You'll never destroy me
I think it's time for you to leave

[In San Diego, BONDS faces Padres pitcher CLAY HENSLEY.]

CLAY HENSLEY

Back in the minors I idolized you
I tried to do all the things that you do
I was even supended for steroid use
I thought I'd get great because of the juice

Now when I make this fateful pitch
I'll ask the Lord to guide it
If I'm to serve up history
I'll serve up irony beside it

[BONDS hits 755 off of CLAY HENSLEY. BUD SELIG responds, sort of, by standing, clapping once and a half, and returning his hands to his pockets.]

BUD SELIG

I award the batter
A smattering of applause
In the matter of steroids
I have probable cause

I am as excited
As a man could be
If repeatedly stung
On the ass by a bee

[Commentators are angry at BUD SELIG for not supporting BARRY BONDS, but also angry at BARRY BONDS for tarnishing baseball's legacy.]

MIKE GOLIC

The commisioner's a coward
The commisioner's a skunk
He said he isn't judging Barry
But that assertion's bunk

Did you see him out there?
He barely raised a hand
He shouldn't have been present
He demonstrated poor command

BOB COSTAS

I am short
And yet long-winded
So now I will declare
That Barry's status as one of the game's great outfielders, which was secure before he started using performance-enhancing drugs — and I am absolutely certain of that, as certain as if I saw a man with a smoking gun standing yards away from another man he had just shot — is hereby tarnished but not entirely rescinded.

[Two nights later, BONDS is back in San Francisco, in the lineup against the Nationals. The pitcher is MIKE BACSIK.]

MIKE BACSIK

Before I went into the windup
I remembered I have a story, too
Now I have made my mind up
To tell that story to you

My father faced Hank Aaron
More than thirty years ago
It's such a big coincidence
It hardly seems legit, I know

And yet, it's absolutely true
Hank had seven-fifty-five
Dad threw a couple pitches
Then got Hank out on a soft line drive

Baseball is a lengthy and complicated narrative
We are only characters — to grasp that is imperative

BARRY BONDS

I wish your tale was something
I could care about.
It isn't. Throw it in here
So I can knock it out.

[BONDS hits 756 off of BACSIK. He is taken out of the game to a standing ovation. Hank Aaron reads a statement on the Jumbotron.]

BARRY BONDS

So much for your moral sense
I launched the ball over the fence

[BUD SELIG is furious. He places another "call" to Hank Aaron.]

BUD SELIG

I'm short of breath. I'm sick to death.
Your home run record's sacrosanct
And this drug-abusing freakshow
Is now the one who is top ranked

You say I should simmer down
You say I shouldn't lose my cool
But I feel like this musclehead
Has played me for a foolish fool

When I ignored the steroid thing
I knew that this would be a risk
Now my life's a welter
Of cream and clear and asterisk
And yet, my heart is cold and barren
This record should be yours, Hank Aaron

[SELIG drops the phone, which is wet with his tears. The next morning, he meets with the same brain trust that recommended calling the 2002 All-Star Game a tie.]

CLIFFORD T. DORKELSON

Here's a brilliant plan
To help you get your man
Let's send in an intern
Dressed up as a spirit
He'll make Barry feel bad
And Barry has to hear it
Pretty soon he'll get to be
The saddest guy in MLB

[Impressed by CLIFFORD T. DORKELSON's brilliant plan, BUD SELIG hires an intern to enter BARRY BONDS's house dressed in a succession of disguises. First, he is ROSS BARNES, who played with the Chicago White Stockings in 1876 and hit baseball's first home run. The costume is pants that are too short.]

INTERN AS ROSS BARNES

I am the man who once upon a time
Hit the first home run
I've been dead a hundred years
It isn't any fun

When I hit my homer
It was off to the races
They were all in-the-park then
So I sped around the bases

BARRY BONDS

You're boring
I'm yawning
The two things are related.
If you are part of history
I'm glad it's what I've desecrated

[The INTERN goes out and comes back as the second ghost, BABE RUTH. The costume is a fatsuit and a Yankees hat.]

INTERN AS BABE RUTH

I don't care that you used drugs
I only care that you got caught
But now you have to be a man
If you want to be the new Sultan of Swat

I might have lost a hundred homers
When balls drifted foul after fair
You don't hear me crying like a girl
Or wallowing in my despair

BARRY BONDS

Zip it, tubby
I don't need to listen to this
You can't lecture me
Didn't you die of syphillis?

[The third ghost is Barry's father, BOBBY BONDS. The costume is amateurish makeup that makes him look vaguely like BARRY and a Father's Day card.]

BOBBY BONDS

I was the first man
To go for thirty-thirty twice
You should listen to me
Respect my fatherly advice

BARRY BONDS

You had as many strikeouts
As you had hits one season
When was that? Nineteen sixty-nine?
It defies all reason.

[The last and final ghost is CRAIG MCNULTY, the pitcher who surrendered BARRY BONDS's first home run. The costume is a piece of paper with "Craig McNulty" written on it.]

CRAIG MCNULTY

A while back
I threw a ball
You hit it past
The outfield wall

It was the first
Home run you hit
I put my head
Into my mitt

Now I ask you
To do what's right
And prove that you
Can feel contrite

Ask that your name
Be taken down
As home run king
Return the crown

BARRY BONDS

I think it's time for you to go
You're not even dead, you know

[The intern returns to BUD SELIG. Both are crestfallen.]

INTERN

We tried to get him to show contrition
Instead he maintained
His nasty disposition
And then in addition
He acted sarcastic
I have to say my Craig McNulty impression was fantastic

[BUD SELIG places another "call" to Hank Aaron, who does not answer. He retreats to his lair, which he calls the Bat-and-ball-cave, to try to resolve the BARRY BONDS problem once and for all.]

BUD SELIG

I do not like this Barry Bonds
His achievements bring me pain, not pleasure
As a result I have devised
A black ops super-secret measure

[BUD SELIG takes out a folder.]

If I can't put him in the slammer
I'll go to my dear friend, the Hammer
I'll unretire him
Then require him
To rejoin a professional team
And reclaim
His good name
By passing back the Great Pretender
Hank will be the Great Defender.
Only a worthy man can end this terrible dream.
I know this seems like a crazy plan
To take down Bonds with an elderly man
But I plan to help out if I can
Oh...
I'll fix it
I'll fix it
I'll Richard-Nixon-dirty-tricks it
If there's one thing I've learned
It's not to get burned
You need defense for every sneak attack
And when a cheater cheats you, you should cheat right back
I'll cook it
I'll cook it
I'll control-the-record-book it
If Hank is batting 0-for-all
I'll call for a gopher ball
From the opposing pitcher
If he complies, I'll make him richer
And Hank can go yard a few more times
He'll get a shot
At clearing up this moral rot
And erasing the shame of Barry's crimes
I have always said
We should make lemonade from lemons
Plus, it's not like Hank is ancient
He's in his early seventies
Just like Roger Clemens
He's in his early seventies
Just...like...Roger...Clemens!!!!!!

[BUD SELIG falls to his knees, clutching the Project Gopher Ball folder. Fade out.]

Ben Greenman is an editor at the New Yorker and the author of several books of fiction. His latest book, A Circle is a Balloon and Compass Both, was recently published.
Also: Catch Ben reading tonight at the Greenwich Village Barnes & Noble, 396 6th Avenue at 8th Street, 7:30 P.M.

Previously: Fragments From 'Weekly World News! The Musical'

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