To Play or Not to Play

I have recently noticed that Barry Bonds, despite his willingness to play for next to nothing, is still without a team to play for. This seems utterly ludicrous to me, even though I know that he did use steroids (allegedly), and I am certainly against cheating in baseball. But with all of the continued scrutiny on his position, the chances of him continuing to use steroids under the shadow of his indictment are slim. There are many good reasons to put him back onto a major league team at least until his trial and it wouldn't be a terrible distraction for the remainder of his season since his trial isn't until 2009.

Since every homerun ball he hits from now until eternity is a record-breaking homerun and thus potentially priceless, I firmly believe that overall attendance at any baseball games he attends would greatly pad the pocket books of those in power. At a time where offense seems to be waning (odd how this happens right in the wake of the steroids controversy), it seems to me that baseball needs attendance. It is even possible that the people who come solely to see Barry Bonds might even rekindle some lost kernel of passion for the game and start to go to more of their teams' games. Either way, it seems very unlikely that the game will lose money with the reinstatement of Bonds (especially since he has agreed to be paid the league minimum, which is around 300k!!!!), but the game stands to make a great deal of money in ticket sales as well as corresponding concession sales.

This may sound odd, but his steroids usage doesn't matter to me right now because one person does not a team make. I don't agree with it, but I am not so alarmist that I believe that it is so incredibly pervasive as to give one team a tremendous boost over a 162 game season. I would certainly be more inclined to go to a game if given the option to see the all-time homerun king, even with his tainted record. It is still a record until a decision is made to strike him from the record which I don't see happening. The worst I could see happening is an asterisk put to his record, a la Roger Maris with his historic homerun season. Maybe someone will read this in the right position and give this poor (:() guy a break. Or perhaps not.

Baseball has a new homerun king!!!

Barry Bonds has entered the record books amidst a swirl of media attention and criticism from every angle of the game: reporters, fans, and fellow players. Tuesday night, during a game with the nationals, it has been reported that he has hit his 756th career homerun off of Washington Nationals pitcher Mike Bacsik. For Mr. Bacsik, this is certainly an ignominious entrance into the history books for him, but since he is only one in a long list of pitchers to surrender a homerun to Barry he should certainly not feel ashamed.

I remarked on a previous posting that I was unsure about how the fans of the game will look towards this historic occasion for the game, given the entire steroids controversy. After seeing the replay of the homerun, I am a little less unsure. Although, since it was hit at San Francisco I would assume the fans would be happy, but I defy anyone who calls themselves baseball fans not to get just a little emotional while seeing the homerun that broke a 33-year-old record.

The crack heard around the world

This is not, as some might presuppose, a posting about a long-ago war. Instead, I am discussing another kind of war that is being fought amidst the bases, between congressman and players, and between the media and a game. This game is baseball, a sport which I hold especially near and dear to my heart and which has recently come under a hailstorm of controversy that I can never remember hearing about at any point during the century old sport. The incident referred to by the title is the 755th home-run hit in his career by one Barry Bonds.

The name itself brings people to the brink of arguments over whether he should even be considered for the Hall of Fame or should be arrested and spend the rest of his life in jail. While I have never personally heard anyone hold the latter position, I do not doubt that there are those out there who might have such a hard-nosed position. As a long-time Reds fan, the hoopla reminds me of the backlash over the controversial moves taken by Pete Rose when he bet on his own team when he was a player-manager. For the uninitiated, Pete Rose is the undisputed batting champion with over 4,000 hits to his credit in a game where reaching the milestone of 3,000 hits is considered an event of monumental proportions.

The connection with Barry Bonds is this: many people with knowledge of what these two players have done for the sport itself will in many small ways discount what they have done because of their supposed excesses. Whether this will be through some kind of an asterisk in the record books, as long ago discussed over the accomplishments of Roger Maris when he beat Babe Ruth's single season record, or a complete disregard of the accomplishments in the record books is yet to be seen. With Pete Rose, it was gambling (and this has been accounted for by Pete Rose himself). With Barry Bonds, it is the supposition that he has taken performance-enhancing drugs to increase his productivity on the field. Whether or not he has done as many already assume may never be known to us with 100 percent certainty, but the fact remains that he will break Hank Aaron's long-held record and become the new, but disputed, home-run champion.

Without making a judgement call on his supposed activities, let me just say that I admire his achievement and believe that it will make a difference upon the entire sport of baseball and hopefully bring attention back upon this historic and much-loved American past-time.

Here are some links that should shed some light on the steroid controversy:
Steroid Controversy Deepens
Was Barry Bonds Targeted?
Barry Bonds: Anatomy of a Scandal
GOOD SOURCE W/ LINKS:
Wikipedia