San Francisco Giants' Barry Bonds picks up record fifth MVP award

<br>NEW YORK (AP) _ Barry Bonds, the hard-slugging outfielder for the San Francisco Giants, won a record fifth Most Valuable Player award Monday. <br><br>Bonds received all 32 first-place votes in balloting

Monday, November 11th 2002, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

NEW YORK (AP) _ Barry Bonds, the hard-slugging outfielder for the San Francisco Giants, won a record fifth Most Valuable Player award Monday.

Bonds received all 32 first-place votes in balloting by the Baseball Writers' Association of America for the National League honor. None of his previous wins was unanimous.

The award means Bonds gets a $500,000 bonus added to his $13 million salary.

St. Louis outfielder Albert Pujols was second, followed by Houston outfielder Lance Berkman and Montreal outfielder Vladimir Guerrero.

Bonds won the MVP award for Pittsburgh in 1990 and 1992 and for the Giants in 1993 and 2001, and is the first player to twice win the honor in consecutive seasons. No other player has won an MVP award more than three times.

The 38-year-old Bonds won his first NL batting title this season with a .370 average and set records with 198 walks, 68 intentional walks and a .582 on-base percentage. He had a .799 slugging percentage, down from his record .863 last year but still good enough to lead the major leagues.

Bonds also hit 46 home runs, down from a record 73 the previous year, and had a team-high 110 RBIs as San Francisco won its first NL pennant since 1989. The Giants lost the World Series to Anaheim in seven games.

MVP voting was conducted before the postseason, when Bonds hit .356 with eight homers, batted in 16 runs and had 27 walks.