SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- When Barry Bonds hit his 756th home run at AT&T Park on Tuesday night to make him baseball's all-time home run king, a 22-year-old New Yorker named Matt Murphy emerged from a pile of fans with a bloody face, torn clothes -- and the historic ball. A team of San Francisco police officers quickly surrounded him, and he informed them he wanted to give the ball to Bonds. The officers led him through a tunnel and into a secure room.
Murphy waited alone for over an hour until the game ended, and Dr. Eva Braun (no relation to the paramour of the late German Chancellor Adolf Hitler) accompanied by three nurses entered the room. Dr. Braun began to interrogate him.
"Are you the young man who wants to give his ball to Mr. Bonds?" she asked.
"That's me, Matt Murphy, from Queens, New York," he replied.
"Well, Matt, Mr. Bonds would very much like to have it," Dr. Braun said. "Ever since the steroids controversy erupted, that's the one thing Mr. Bonds has wanted." She proceeded to rattle off a string of questions. "Are you 18-25 years of age?" "Are you a smoker?" "Does your family have any history of heart disease, diabetes, high cholesterol, liver disease or mental illness?" The medical team furiously recorded Murphy's responses, which seemed to satisfy them.
Finally, Dr. Braun handed Murphy a plastic cup and a Penthouse Magazine. "Matt, would you please go into the rest room and give us a sperm sample?" Murphy wasn't sure how this related to presenting the historic ball to Bonds, but he shrugged his shoulders. "Gladly," he said.
Less than a minute later Murphy presented the specimen to the team. Dr. Braun then asked Murphy if she could give him a hernia test. "Sure," he said. "Turn your head and cough," she told him as she reached into his pants. "Nice," she uttered to herself. "They'll do." Murphy was told to lie down on a gurney, and some further tests were performed. A short time later, Bonds entered the room and without saying a word reclined on a gurney next to Murphy. Murphy was speechless, unable to fathom what was happening. Then another physician anesthetized Bonds. Several minutes passed, and Murphy broke out into a terrified sweat as he saw Dr. Braun quickly and methodically removed one of Bonds' testicles, shrivelled beyond recognition by years of steroid abuse. She tossed it into a nearby trash can.
Murphy struggled before orderlies subdued him, and he, too, was anesthetized. The last thing he remembered seeing before losing consciousness was Dr. Braun coming toward him with a knife. "You will always be remembered, Matt," he heard her say, "as the man who gave Mr. Bonds the historic ball."
