People will accuse me of writing this article just to antagonize readers into commenting, etc. In fact, the idea for it was proposed in just such a fashion. Superficially, that's not an outrageous accusation.
I mean, I am an irrationally die-hard San Francisco Giants fan. As such, I have every reason to invent defenses for Barry Lamar Bonds. The only difference between the ultra-competitive Giants teams of '97 through 2003 and the atrocities that have been fielded since is a healthy No. 25.
Barry was a force of chemically-enhanced nature for the team I love. His presence made everyone in the lineup offensively better by several orders of magnitude. Every at-bat had the potential to right the course of a game gone awry. Without him, the Orange and Black went from perennial contender to de-clawed kitten. So why wouldn't I, or any fan in a similar position, blindly defend him?
Because that's not really the reason I write here.
As I've said before, I'm just interested in the catharsis of knowing that at least one sane and honest argument is floating in cyberspace. If I blindly defended, criticized, supported, or otherwise commented on anything, it would defeat that purpose.
And that's why I'll defend Barry from all the steroid abuse—it's just dishonest. Most people dislike Barry for various and good reasons. My problem is that they spew their venom under the guise of self-righteous indignation, claiming he destroyed the purity of the game.
That's just false. One person cannot ruin a game as big and old as baseball. Not even Bud Selig.
The indisputable fact is that a very significant percentage of the entire league was on something, along with Barry. And he was not the first. Just take a look at the Mitchell Report (and by all accounts it barely scratched the surface).
Many of his fellow users were pitchers—starters and relievers. After all, if the primary benefit to use is reduced recovery time, then relief pitchers are as logical candidates as sluggers. They face the most extreme daily stress potential.
Roger Clemens, Jason Grimsley, and Eric Gagne lend credence to both ideas.
The fact that the percentage of use was so high is very significant. It severely discredits righteous indignation over destroying baseball as the real reason for all the abuse lobbed Bonds' way. Why only Barry? He didn't start it and he wasn't the only one. He is just, to date, the best chemically-enhanced ballplayer we've seen.
Why not Mark McGwire? Why not Sammy Sosa? What about Brady Anderson? Or Jose Canseco? Why not any of the other guys who are implicated and suddenly became prolific sluggers?
Or how about Clemens? He's just as implicated as Bonds and he threw a broken bat at a guy. Not only that, he explained it away by claiming he thought it was the ball. (I'm going to need an explanation for that explanation, i.e. why the hell would you be throwing the ball at a runner?)
The high percentage also means that an enhanced Bonds usually performed against other enhanced athletes. Consequently, enhancement is a fatuous reason for diminishing Barry's accomplishments when compared to his contemporaries. The reality is, he had no artificial advantage that they did not possess themselves.
9 comments Last one added 9 months ago — Leave a Comment
Dnob Yarrb 9 months ago
This article misses the point of the Steroids nonsense. Like OJ or Bill Clinton, where this goes over the top with Bonds is the arrogance. He lied under oath, he takes his fans for fools. Your article takes for granted that Bonds knowingly used steroids. He still denies it. It is bring out his worst. And, it may land him in jail. This is the problem with Barry Bonds and the steroid nonsense.
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Andrew Nuschler 9 months ago
I agree with all this. And it is yet another reason to dislike Bonds the individual.
But that still doesn't diminish his accomplishments on the field or change the fact that he was obviously not the only player on juice. This seems to be the thrust of the attack at him and that is what I take exception to.
But thanks for the constructive criticism. Not everyone's gonna agree with me and I appreciate you weren't an ass about it.
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Paul Car 9 months ago
"he lied under oath"
Is he the only one to do so? Did other athletes? Why just Bonds? That's the point.
I'm still a holdout that Greg gave him the dope under orders from Bonds not to do so. It's all going to come out in the trial. If Bonds position is improved or he is vindicated, i only hope all the haters that chipped in to try to ruin this mans life, admit what jerks they have been. Most likely, even if not found guilty, Bonds rep has been destroyed and history will point at this time being The Worst Travesty in Baseball History.
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Andrew Nuschler 9 months ago
I'd love to believe Bonds was totally innocent, but it's too much of a stretch.
He's a supremely conditioned athlete who's not gonna put something into/onto his boy without knowing exactly what it is. Maybe he would've trusted Anderson enough, but that chance is SO small that it really amounts to 0.
But I agree man, his BASEBALL reputation is being destroyed for something the majority of the league did and that's wrong. If you're going to attack performance or reputation for such, then it's gotta be a broader attack. Right now, it's conveniently focused on Bonds because he was enormously unlikeable.
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John Pohlman 9 months ago
You must really love Bonds to totally exonerate him but your assertion that it didn't matter that Bonds took steroids because "everyone else was taking them" is silly. Let me try to explain a very delicate but important point. - There are tons of good home run hitters that couldn't hit 60 home runs even with steroids but when cream of the crop takes steroids at the right time they are going to hit numbers that are totally inflated. Now the record books ARE SCREWED FOREVER. This is more serious than anybody realizes. Bonds hit 73 home runs and it wasn't that big of a deal. 20 years ago it would have been like watching God himself coming down to earth. Now it's ho-hum.
I keep trying to like Bonds but he probably cheated because of his arrogance. If you were around back in the early 90's you would remember that Bonds was threatened by Griffey who was blowing him away at that time. Griffey was batting against those other supposedly juiced pitchers but he didn't use that as an excuse. He could have hit 80 home runs but because he didn't use he will be just a minor asterisk in history.
I'm not sure I explained myself very well but it is my firm opinion that Bonds' accomplishments are indeed greatly diminished just like Clemens.
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Andrew Nuschler 9 months ago
John,
First, I really love the Giants, which is why I'm defending Bonds (I'm not exonerating him). And even then, all I'm defending him on is being singled out as the steroid antichrist since he was not the only one on juice, just the best.
As for the record books being screwed forever, that's a bit overdramatic. The same could have been said when baseball came out of the Dead Ball Era. Or integrated. Or with the introduction of stimulants. Or weight-training. Or transcontinental travel.
As I said, comparing records across generations is fun but meaningless. Do you really think a game that saw 8 teams on one coast with pitchers throwing CGs every time out is the same as one with 30 teams scattered across the country and bullpens packed to the gills? jJust because we call them the same name?
Look at the K rates for Pete's sake. 300+ IP and less than 100 Ks? To me, that says even the best pitchers threw to contact b/c there was 0 fear of serious damage. You really think that's the same game as today's?
Or let me put it to you another way. What if a pitcher next year throws 300+ innings and 25+ CGs? Wouldn't that be like "God himself" coming down to Earth? But in 1918 it would have been ho-hum. So which version is the cheap one? Which is tainted?
Next, I was around in the early '90s. And even if I wasn't, did you think I'd just take your word that Griffey blew Bonds away? Look at the stats. Bonds usually OUTPERFORMED Griffey and, when he didn't, it certainly wasn't a blow-out. Additionally, Bonds' teams were better. I'm not sure what you're measuring when you say Griffey was blowing Bonds away. I guess maybe defensive prowess.
As for Griffey not using, what makes you so sure? He suffered injury after injury and they were usually muscle or tendon related - strains, tears, etc. I'm no doctor, but these are the types of injury you often see with steroid abuse. He also broke bones so it just as easily could have been bad luck, but I'd hold off on totally exonerating a player during the Steroid Era who put up good numbers when he wasn't out with tears and strains to those pieces of the body most vulnerable when using steroids.
If you want to say that Bonds accomplishments are diminished compared to history, fine. I think you're wrong for the reasons above, but that's a valid opinion. If you say they're diminished compared to his contemporaries because of steroids, well that's just naive (if you're gonna call my assertion 'silly,' that's what I will call yours).
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Scott Swanson 9 months ago
Griffey was never, ever, "blowing away" Barry Bonds. If you compare the two players statistics through the 1990's they are very similar. Hands down, they were the top two players. In my opinion, Bonds was the better of the two in the '90s. The Sporting News agreed when they named Bonds the player of the decade in the 1990's.
And I disagree with John. Bonds was juicing, but so was nearly everyone else. Bonds went from being possibly the greatest player of all-time, steroid free, to being something the likes of which will never be seen again when he was chemically enhanced. His numbers from 2001 to 2004, the greatest four year span in the history of the game, will never be duplicated. And he was doing that against a large number of juicing pitchers. He put up some numbers during this time period that are completely ridiculous (73 home runs is high, but it's not as astounding as the .609 on-base percentage, which doesn't receive nearly enough recognition for what it truly is).
The best players, Clemens, Bonds, McGwire, Sosa, Palmeiro, etc. weren't the only ones using steriods. Hundreds of minor leaguers were juicing, in hopes of getting a promotion from A to AA. Hundreds more in Latin America were juicing in hopes of succeeding down there and possibly getting noticed by the MLB. And although illegal drug use has probably diminished in the last couple years, it is far from gone today, and it never will be. People always have, and always will, do whatever it takes to get an upper-hand. Whether it's high schoolers, college athletes or professionals. Illegal drugs in sports will never go away.
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Scott Swanson 9 months ago
Griffey was never, ever, "blowing away" Barry Bonds. If you compare the two players statistics through the 1990's they are very similar. Hands down, they were the top two players. In my opinion, Bonds was the better of the two in the '90s. The Sporting News agreed when they named Bonds the player of the decade in the 1990's.
And I disagree with John. Bonds was juicing, but so was nearly everyone else. Bonds went from being possibly the greatest player of all-time, steroid free, to being something the likes of which will never be seen again when he was chemically enhanced. His numbers from 2001 to 2004, the greatest four year span in the history of the game, will never be duplicated. And he was doing that against a large number of juicing pitchers. He put up some numbers during this time period that are completely ridiculous (73 home runs is high, but it's not as astounding as the .609 on-base percentage, which doesn't receive nearly enough recognition for what it truly is).
The best players, Clemens, Bonds, McGwire, Sosa, Palmeiro, etc. weren't the only ones using steriods. Hundreds of minor leaguers were juicing, in hopes of getting a promotion from A to AA. Hundreds more in Latin America were juicing in hopes of succeeding down there and possibly getting noticed by the MLB. And although illegal drug use has probably diminished in the last couple years, it is far from gone today, and it never will be. People always have, and always will, do whatever it takes to get an upper-hand. Whether it's high schoolers, college athletes or professionals. Illegal drugs in sports will never go away.
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Andrew Nuschler 9 months ago
I love it Scott.
The article was already long enough so I probably wouldn't have included it had I thought of it, but you make an excellent point about the state of use in the lower levels as well as in the current game.
You clearly understand exactly what I'm saying and know what you're talking about (another excellent point about the onbase %).
Thanks for taking the time to chime in.
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