[pico]

Bonds' historic home run ball headed to HOF with asterisk

September 26, 2007
NEW YORK (TICKER) -- Barry Bonds' 756th home run ball will be branded with an asterisk and sent to the Baseball Hall of Fame, fashion designer Mark Ecko revealed Wednesday on NBC's "Today Show."

Ecko purchased the ball for just over $752,000 after winning an auction held by Sotheby's before allowing the public to have a say in what its fate should be.

Over 10 million people voted and were given the options of banishing it into space, bestowing it to the Hall of Fame or branding it with an asterisk, due to the popular thought that Bonds used performance-enhancing drugs to accomplish the feat.

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The decision was a landslide as 47 percent of voters put their support behind branding it while 34 percent voted to bestow it to the Hall of Fame.

"We're going to be working with the folks at the Hall of Fame. It is a historical museum. We want to treat this ball as such, as an artifact with respect," Ecko said on the Today Show.

"You bet we're happy to get it," Hall of Fame president Dale Petroskey said. "This ball wouldn't be coming to Cooperstown without Mark Ecko buying it from the fan who caught it and then putting it up to the vote of the fans."

Bonds hit the historic 756th home run on August 7 off Washington Nationals starter Mike Bacsik, ending the 33-year reign of Hank Aaron as baseball's all-time home run leader.

The announcement came on the same day that Bonds will take his position in left field for the final time at home as a member of the San Francisco Giants.

[bigboydan]

I doubt that really matter or not to the HOF though. I'm sure they will display the ball without that stamp even showing somehow.