SAN FRANCISCO — A man who says he was "mugged" for Barry Bonds record-setting 73d home run ball spent a second day on the stand Friday, denying he changed his tune after the minute-long melee that ensued after he grabbed the ball.

"Isn't it true that in just a little over two minutes your story evolved from 'it disappeared, I didn't feel it come out of my glove' ... to 'I f---ing caught that ball and he f---ing took it out of my glove'?" asked Michael Lee, lead attorney for the defendant, Patrick Hayashi.

"That's false information," replied Alex Popov, who is suing Hayashi for the ball.

The lawyer, Lee, had just finished pulling Popov's quotes from footage of the Oct. 7, 2001, melee in the walkway behind right field in Pacific Bell park.  The tape, shot by local cameraman Josh Keppel, shows Popov snaring the home run, disappearing into a mass of fans, and protesting when, a minute later, Hayashi brandished the ball for the camera.

Popov, 38, a health food restaurateur claims that Hayashi stole the ball from his mitt in the pile-up.  Under cross-examination Friday, Popov admitted that neither he nor any of the 13 eyewitnesses who testified on his behalf actually saw Hayashi take the ball from his mitt.

As part of his lawsuit, Popov has alleged that Hayashi committed assault and battery as he scrapped for the ball.  But Popov also testified that he couldn t be sure that Hayashi pulled him to the concrete, piled on top of him, or tugged at his clothing, as he alleged in that assault count.

Hayashi, 37, a software engineer, argued during his time on the stand that Popov wasn't the only one who ended up on the ground after Bonds' home run ball landed in the stands. He testified Tuesday and Wednesday that as he raised himself up off the concrete he found the valuable ball loose on the ground in front of him.

Popov's lack of certainty over Hayashi's actions in the scrum could dilute the charges of fraud, but his claim that he possessed the ball rests on the definition of control that will be determined later in the trial.

The central legal question facing Superior Court Judge Kevin McCarthy is what standard to apply to a baseball that lands in the stands.

Hayashi's team has advocated a strict definition of possession which they term "unequivocal dominion and control."

"It s not a catch if you drop the ball," Hayashi has repeated throughout the trial.

Scott Siciliano, a mobile home construction worker who caught Bonds' 69th home run, testified to that effect as Hayashi's first witness, detailing the process that major league officials conducted to authorize his ball.

The ball itself landed in McCovey Cove, preventing the officials from affixing a special hologram used to authenticate the ball.  So they improvised, using a hair dryer, Siciliano testified.  "It took about 10 minutes to dry the ball, and they were eventually able to put the sticker on the ball," he told the court.

Hayashi's ball was authenticated in a similar manner, leading his lawyers to suggest that it was effectively given to him by Major League Baseball.

Siciliano returned the last day of the Giants' 2001 season, again sitting in McCovey Cove in a kayak. "I saw the ball disappear into a glove," he testified.  "At some point ... it looked like to me that he had dropped the ball." 

Hayashi's defense will continue on Monday.