Barry Bonds hit his 73rd run and set the a major league record for slugging percentage as the San Francisco Giants completed the season with a 2-1 victory over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Sunday. 
After sitting out Saturday, Bonds faced knuckleballer Dennis Springer with two outs in the first inning. The three-time Most Valuable Player was just 1-for-7 lifetime against Springer before sending a 3-2 pitch over the right-field fence for his record home run and a 1-0 lead. 
Bonds singled in the third inning, popped out in the sixth and flied out in his final at-bat in the eighth. He finished with an .863 slugging percentage, bettering the mark of .847 set by Hall of Famer Babe Ruth in 1920. 
The 37-year-old Bonds also walked 177 times, seven more than the record that Ruth set in 1923. 
Mark Gardner struck out one in a perfect seventh inning for the win as San Francisco completed its second straight 90-win season. 
In St. Louis, the Houston Astros have home-field advantage throughout the postseason. 
Shane Reynolds' 100th career win may have been his most important as he pitched the Astros to a 9-2 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals that clinched the Central Division title and the top playoff seed in the National League. 
Reynolds held the Cardinals to one run -- a solo homer by J.D. Drew -- and eight hits in 7 1/3 innings. He walked none and struck out one. 
Matched up against former team mate Darryl Kile, Reynolds became just the seventh pitcher to win 100 games with the Astros. But Sunday's victory carried with it the luxury of avoiding the Arizona Diamondbacks' 1-2 punch of Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling in the best-of-five Division Series. 
Instead, the Astros will face the NL East champion Atlanta Braves. 
St. Louis needed to win two of three games this weekend to secure the division title. But the Cardinals settled for the wild card berth and will face Johnson and Arizona in Game One of the Division Series Tuesday. 
In Atlanta, the Braves became the first team in major league history to win a division with a losing record at home, suffering a season-ending 4-2 loss to the Florida Marlins. 
Atlanta, which clinched its 10th straight division title on Friday, finished 40-41 at Turner Field. The Braves had a 48-33 mark on the road. 
Despite its struggles at home, Atlanta finished three games ahead of the Philadelphia Phillies in the National League East. But the Braves failed to reach 90 wins in a full season for the first time since 1990. 
It marked the final game for Florida manager Tony Perez, who will move into the team's front office next season. 
"We got all the pitchers in that we needed to get in and all the hitters some at-bats, which is good," Braves manager Bobby Cox. "Physically, we're ready to go." 
In Chicago, Sammy Sosa continued to make history as his Chicago Cubs suffered a season-ending 4-3 loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates. 
Sosa belted his 64th homer of the season and the 450th of his career, a solo shot in the eighth inning off Mike Lincoln, to break a pair of total base records and complete one of the most spectacular four-year stretches in baseball annals. 
With 425 total bases this season, the outfielder surpassed the Chicago record of 423 -- set by Hack Wilson in 1930. His 1,619 total bases over the past four seasons are two more than Chuck Klein, who set the National League four-year mark from 1929-32 while with the Philadelphia Phillies. 
By also driving in a run with a first-inning single, Sosa finished the campaign with 160 RBI, becoming the first National Leaguer to collect at least 160 since Klein had 170 in 1930. 
Sosa hit 66 homers and drove in 158 runs three seasons ago in his famed home run battle with St. Louis' Mark McGwire. This year, he also led the NL with 146 runs. 
In Cincinnati, Pat Burrell homered and drove in three runs as the Philadelphia Phillies posted a 4-1 victory over the Cincinnati Reds. 
Randy Wolf allowed seven hits while walking one and striking out eight and has allowed just one earned run in his last three starts. He was 5-1 in his last seven starts, including two complete games. 
"It was a fun way to go out," Wolf said. 
In Milwaukee, Richie Sexson hit his 45th home run and matched a career high with five RBI, powering Milwaukee to a 15-5 rout of the playoff-bound Arizona Diamondbacks. 
The loss cost the Diamondbacks home-field advantage throughout the postseason. 
Milwaukee's 68-94 record was its worst in 17 years, but Sexson helped the Brewers avoid their first 95-loss season since 1977. 
Rookie Gary Knott surrendered eight unearned runs and seven hits in 3 2/3 innings for the Diamondbacks, the National League West champions who will host the St. Louis Cardinals on Tuesday in Game One of their Division Series. 
In New York, Britt Reames and Mark Smith helped the Montreal Expos end a disappointing season on a positive note. 
Reames pitched 5 2/3 scoreless innings and Smith hit a three-run homer to give the Expos a 5-0 victory over the New York Mets. 
The Expos finished the season in last place with a 68-94 season, the fourth straight year the floundering franchise, which is rumored to be relocating almost yearly, has won less than 70 games. 
It also was a season of disappointment for the Mets , who closed the year with six losses in nine games. 
The defending National League champions won 25 of 30 games before the slide and were eliminated from postseason contention Tuesday. New York won 94 games a year ago. 
In San Diego, Padre fans said goodbye to one certain Hall of Famer and paid homage to another sure-fire Cooperstown hero. 
Ricky Henderson, the greatest leadoff hitter in baseball history, became the 25th player in major league history to record 3,000 hits with a leadoff double in the bottom of the first inning of the Padres' 14-5 loss to the Colorado Rockies. 
The outcome hardly mattered as the afternoon belonged to the Henderson and 41-year-old Tony Gwynn, retiring after 20 seasons. 
Henderson blooped the first pitch from John Thomson into right field to tie the late Roberto Clemente on the all-time hit list. 
The Padres had a postgame ceremony for Gwynn, also a member of the 3,000-hit club. who pinch-hit in the ninth. 
The Rockies erased a 3-2 deficit with eight runs in the top of the fourth, highlighted by a pair of two-run homers by Jacob Cruz and Juan Uribe, who also belted a three-run shot in the ninth.