Cheering for Barry Bonds

[wolveraptor]

A few days ago I found myself stuck in typical Los Angeles traffic, passed a gas station that was offering a gallon of unleaded for $3.25, and heard on the news that Iran was considering backing up its threats with nuclear weapons.

So when I heard someone in the office say Barry Bonds had just hit another home run, I quickly changed the station to the Giants-Mets game so I could see a replay.

Why? Because watching Barry Bonds at the plate is fun.

Plain and simple.

We live in a wild world where, depending on whom you listen to, horrible things are always seemingly on the horizon and getting closer by the second. From gas prices hitting everybody hard in the pocket to the uncertainty of the nation's well being, your temperament can really be tested.

That's where Bonds comes in. Any time he comes to the plate, a Giants game in April suddenly becomes must-see television. It's better than Seinfeld in the late 1990s or the Sopranos whenever it's on.

But yet, for a majority of baseball fans, cheering for Bonds is as comfortable as being the best man in your ex-girlfriend's wedding.

Why? Well, I guess those steroid allegations have something to with it. And that's too bad.

We turn to sports for entertainment, and right now Bonds' pursuit of Hank Aaron's home run record is like a glass of cold water after a long run — delicious.

Maybe Bonds is guilty of taking steroids. And maybe we'll find out for sure sometime in the near future.

Bonds could rub so much steroid cream on his arms that his bat flies out of his hands every time he even thinks of taking one of his awe-inspiring cuts and I wouldn't blink and eye. Just as long as he gets his bat back and is given another chance to launch one into McCovey's Cove.

Is it really that bad for America if an athlete opts to put their body at risk in order to become a better player? Am I really the only one who thinks the idea of a steroid-only baseball league is as attractive as Jessica Simpson knocking on your door at 3 a.m. with a case of cold beer under her arm?

Athletes who go this route know what they are getting into. In the end, it's their body being harmed, not ours. So why should we worry? Why don't we just sit back and watch the balls leave the stadium like a 747 leaving LAX bound for London.

Another reason why people don't like to show their support for Bonds is because they feel he's not sending a good message to kids. How is pushing aside distractions the size of Rosie O'Donnell in a good year and doing his job to the best of his abilities a poor message? Just doesn't seem to make any sense, right? If Bonds can still go out there and perform, maybe little Billy can shake off that cold and get to school on time.

Many of the same people who are quick to call Bonds a cheater are also the ones to call an athlete who admittedly takes a cortisone shot a "gamer." That has to be a little bit (OK, a lot) of a double standard, because without those cortisone shots, chances are that player isn't going to be able to perform up to the level where they are used to performing. I know I only studied journalism in college, but that seems to be a performance enhancer, right? So where's the uproar?

There's also those out there who choose not to cheer for Bonds because they think he's a jerk. He's got his own leather chair in the corner of the Giants' locker room and always seems to be so surly around the media.

How is that any worse than hearing Tom Cruise chew out Brooke Shields for taking pills to help deal with her depression? Yet Mission Impossible III will still make millions of dollars and nobody will wear "Ban Cruise" shirts to the premiere.

The argument about not allowing Bonds into the Hall of Fame, meanwhile, is pretty laughable. Wow, wouldn't that just be horrible for Bonds to not be included in a building where people go to look at old shirts behind glass cases. Ho hum. Even if Bonds doesn't get chosen for the Hall, chances are his career will be forever remembered for the numbers he put up and the history he made.

Instead of getting so heated about what a baseball player — remember, Bonds is not a doctor, or a teacher or a police officer; he's an adult playing a kid's game — may or may not do to make himself a better hitter, sit back and just let him do his thing.

It's not the end of the world. It's only baseball.

Remember, cheering for Barry Bonds can be a fun. It's like watching an R-rated movie when you were 11 years old and your parents were out for the night. You knew it wasn't the popular decision, but it sure was a good time. And did it really ever hurt anyone?

This guy is a dickhead. He seems to be unable to make a distinction between what's fun to watch and what is acceptable to the integrity of baseball. The bolded phrase especially speaks volumes: yes asshole, you're pretty much the only one who wants to see an all-steroid league. Only Faux could hire such a fucking idiot. I mean, hearing this from a goddamn sports writer is absolutely disgraceful.

[wolveraptor]

Ghetto edit: I put this in Science, Logic and Morality because it does relate to the latter.

[Count Dooku]

I HATE articles that display steroids as dangerous drugs. Let's face the facts folks, steroids aren't nearly as dangerous as we are led to believe. The media makes two claims: steroids kill about 400 people in the U.S. a year, and about 3 million adults are using them illegaly. That means that there is a 1/7500 chance a steroid user will be killed from steroid use! Those are decent odds, especially considering that tobacco use will kill a HUGE portion of it's users, and I think we can all agree that FAR more than 1/7500 tabacco users will be killed by that deadly plant.

The 400 steroid related deaths a year that the media has so readily thrown around is EXTREMELY misleading. 90% of those deaths are NOT caused by steroids - instead, the athletes died from insulin abuse (insulin is used to enhance the size of the muscle, and it's a dangerous practice), DNP use (again, DNP is NOT a steroid. It's rat posion. It's used for weight loss), or from the use of hard drugs (cocaine, heroine, etc). Only 10% of all steroid 'related' deaths are actually caused by steroids.

Don't make steroids out to be some deadly killer, because it's not. It might give an athlete greater stamina and bigger muscles, BUT IT WON'T MAKE HIM HIT A BALL BETTER! In order to hit a ball, you've got to have AMAZING hand-eye coordination - strength has little to do with it. Professional baseball players are getting lazer eye surgery, but where is the public outcry about that!? Steroids are, by and large, NOT helping their game. If any outside force is influencing how they play, it's the damned eye surgery.

I'm disgusted that someone would accuse steroids of being an evil substance. It makes that person(s) sound like a fundie Christian who attacks anything they don't understand or agree with. Do some fucking research before you post gibberish like this again.

[God Fearing Atheist]

The game only suffers, IMHO, when steroid users take unfair advantage of playing in leagues dominated by non-users. I have no problem with Bonds playing in a Steroid League. I just dont want him in the NL.

And Beckett is going to kick Yankee ass tonight.

[Darth Wong]

I HATE articles that display steroids as dangerous drugs. Let's face the facts folks, steroids aren't nearly as dangerous as we are led to believe. The media makes two claims: steroids kill about 400 people in the U.S. a year, and about 3 million adults are using them illegaly. That means that there is a 1/7500 chance a steroid user will be killed from steroid use! Those are decent odds, especially considering that tobacco use will kill a HUGE portion of it's users, and I think we can all agree that FAR more than 1/7500 tabacco users will be killed by that deadly plant.

The fact that tobacco kills more people than steroids does not refute the claim that steroids are dangerous, moron.

The 400 steroid related deaths a year that the media has so readily thrown around is EXTREMELY misleading. 90% of those deaths are NOT caused by steroids - instead, the athletes died from insulin abuse (insulin is used to enhance the size of the muscle, and it's a dangerous practice), DNP use (again, DNP is NOT a steroid. It's rat posion. It's used for weight loss), or from the use of hard drugs (cocaine, heroine, etc). Only 10% of all steroid 'related' deaths are actually caused by steroids.

A number which is probably a dangerous underestimate when one considers that many of the damage mechanisms (such as liver damage) cause long-term health problems that (unlike lung cancer for tobacco) aren't always obviously connected to the steroid use. By ignoring all of the side-effects other than short-term fatalities, you are employing an absurdly reductionist approach to public health risks.

Don't make steroids out to be some deadly killer, because it's not. It might give an athlete greater stamina and bigger muscles, BUT IT WON'T MAKE HIM HIT A BALL BETTER! In order to hit a ball, you've got to have AMAZING hand-eye coordination - strength has little to do with it. Professional baseball players are getting lazer eye surgery, but where is the public outcry about that!? Steroids are, by and large, NOT helping their game. If any outside force is influencing how they play, it's the damned eye surgery.

You're full of shit. Barry Bonds went from being a 30 HR a year player before steroids to a record-setting power hitter after steroids. The steroids don't help with his hand-eye co-ordination but they do help him accelerate the bat faster, which obviously makes a difference to his HR totals. Also, he used HGH to improve his eyesight.

I'm disgusted that someone would accuse steroids of being an evil substance.

I'm disgusted that a blithering idiot such as yourself would ignore medical studies showing that steroids are a dangerous substance, with not a shred of evidence to back up your position other than the idiotic notion that they can't be dangerous if they don't cause a large number of deaths relatively to vastly more popular drugs such as tobacco.

It makes that person(s) sound like a fundie Christian who attacks anything they don't understand or agree with. Do some fucking research before you post gibberish like this again.

OK, you E-mail the Mayo Clinic and tell them they're totally wrong then.

[wolveraptor]

Most of your post was irrelevant nonsense. I didn't make one damned claim about how harmful steroids are. This section actually related to what I said.

Don't make steroids out to be some deadly killer, because it's not. It might give an athlete greater stamina and bigger muscles, BUT IT WON'T MAKE HIM HIT A BALL BETTER! In order to hit a ball, you've got to have AMAZING hand-eye coordination - strength has little to do with it. Professional baseball players are getting lazer eye surgery, but where is the public outcry about that!? Steroids are, by and large, NOT helping their game. If any outside force is influencing how they play, it's the damned eye surgery.

I contest your statement that eye-surgery can actually cause eyes to function better, rather than just fixing any irregularities in players. Since the standard bar for vision is 20/20, every procedure I've heard of restores the eyes to this level, rather than bringing them to a different level.

Your other claim implies that any moron with good hand-eye coordination can hit a ball as far and as well as a Major Leaguer. That stinks of bullshit to me. The speed at which one swings a bat is directly influenced by strength. Are you seriously saying that, assuming one's reflexes and adroitness remain constant, a faster swing won't help?[/b]

[Count Dooku]

Wong, in 1989 when Steroids came up for review in the U.S. Congress, as to whether they should be classified as controlled substances, the FDA said they should NOT be, because of a LACK of definitive evidence showing they were harmful enough to warrant criminalization. To me, that is a HUGE statement by the organization that launched a seven year study into the matter. The FDA isn't full of idiots...or at least not as many as some might think.

[wolveraptor]

Damn, I'm slow...

[Count Dooku]

I contest your statement that eye-surgery can actually cause eyes to function better, rather than just fixing any irregularities in players. Since the standard bar for vision is 20/20, every procedure I've heard of restores the eyes to this level, rather than bringing them to a different level.

Your other claim implies that any moron with good hand-eye coordination can hit a ball as far and as well as a Major Leaguer. That stinks of bullshit to me. The speed at which one swings a bat is directly influenced by strength. Are you seriously saying that, assuming one's reflexes and adroitness remain constant, a faster swing won't help?[/b]

Lazer eye surgery can bring vision to 20/20, and, in some cases, better.

I concede that a faster swing might help, but to what degree? Certainly not enough to warrant a major change in the players ability. The year before Bond's began his home run marathon, he switched to a new bat that was 3oz. lighter than any other bat of comparable length in the league. Why is that not also brought up!? It's certainly easy to blame steroids for a faster bat, but why not blame the bat? Since Bond's pioneered the new bat, several other players have switched the bat that they use. There is a LOT more to this entire situation than any of us are willing to admit.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

I contest your statement that eye-surgery can actually cause eyes to function better, rather than just fixing any irregularities in players. Since the standard bar for vision is 20/20, every procedure I've heard of restores the eyes to this level, rather than bringing them to a different level.

Your other claim implies that any moron with good hand-eye coordination can hit a ball as far and as well as a Major Leaguer. That stinks of bullshit to me. The speed at which one swings a bat is directly influenced by strength. Are you seriously saying that, assuming one's reflexes and adroitness remain constant, a faster swing won't help?[/b]

Lazer eye surgery can bring vision to 20/20, and, in some cases, better.

I concede that a faster swing might help, but to what degree? Certainly not enough to warrant a major change in the players ability.

Because a faster swing means you accelerate the bat faster. The quicker the bat is accelerated, the sooner it will be up to speed (allowing the hitter an extra fraction of a second to evaluate a pitch before he commits to it,) or the higher it's velocity will be when it makes contact with the ball. (Hitting a baseball with a bat is a momentum transfer, where we convert some of the bat's momentum into ball velocity in a desirable direction.) So a faster swing means a faster batted ball.

The year before Bond's began his home run marathon, he switched to a new bat that was 3oz. lighter than any other bat of comparable length in the league. Why is that not also brought up!?

A heaver bat carries greater momentum at a given velocity than a lighter bat. And Bonds' bat was 32 ounces, which was only one ounce lighter than the 33 ounce bat Roger Maris used when he first set his home run record. Mark McGwire used a 35 ounce bat to hit three fewer homers than Bonds did. The common bat weight used by major league players is between 31 to 35 ounces. Hell, Babe Ruth hit one less home run than Maris did, using a big 40 ounce bruiser of a bat.(1)

The point here is that the weight of the bat can be considered insignificant. It is well within the range of bat weights commonly used in the major leagues today.

It's certainly easy to blame steroids for a faster bat, but why not blame the bat? Since Bond's pioneered the new bat, several other players have switched the bat that they use. There is a LOT more to this entire situation than any of us are willing to admit.

Because the bats favored by major-league players sit within ten percent of that 32 ounce bat used by Bonds. Furthermore, the difference between bat materials only yield a few percentage points differences in batted-ball velocity. (The velocity of the ball and it's departing angle dictate its trajectory. A faster ball leaving the bat at 45 degrees will travel further than a slower ball at the same angle.)

As a result, from a physics standpoint, the bat should only contribute a very small effect to a given hitter's ability to knock them out of the park. For a hitter to hit home runs, he needs to be able to swing the bat really fast (for more momentum transfer to the ball) and at the right time (so the ball makes contact with the so-called "sweet-spot" of the bat and departs at a good angle.) These are both factors which are dictated by the player, so if a player suddenly starts showing 200% improvement over where he was in seasons immediately before, then we have to wonder what it is the player is doing to himself to give him such an edge. (The effect of equipment should be no more than say 10 - 20% (corresponding roughly to the increases in speed offered by a faster-swinging bat made of a more elastic material.) For a player of a given skill, it might tack on a few extra home runs in a given season, but not forty!)

[Darth Wong]

Wong, in 1989 when Steroids came up for review in the U.S. Congress, as to whether they should be classified as controlled substances, the FDA said they should NOT be, because of a LACK of definitive evidence showing they were harmful enough to warrant criminalization. To me, that is a HUGE statement by the organization that launched a seven year study into the matter. The FDA isn't full of idiots...or at least not as many as some might think.

Oh really? Perhaps you should look at the congressional testimony of the FDA's former chief executive, who admitted under oath that FDA procedures were imbalanced toward speedy rubber-stamp approval at the expense of public health protection.

As for the batting issue, your moron logic would lead to the conclusion that a child could knock one out of the park if he puts the bat in the right place.

[CarsonPalmer]

Hey Count Dooku, a couple of nights ago, I saw a Yankee batter hit a nice, deep fly ball to center field and I thought, gee, if he had been using steroids, he would have hit that ball over the fence. That is the difference with steroids. Got it?

[Darth Wong]

Who wants to bet that Count Dooku is either using steroids now or has used them in the past?

[Covenant]

Extra muscle tissue not only helps impart more force into the ball, but also helps keep the bat from rebounding at all on impact. Like an impact baton's dramatic increase of bashing potential, big beefy arms that help me swing through a ball rather than into it helps keep the ball going the right direction and helps return it with a maximum amount of force. This is why more rigid materials are more effective, afterall, they don't push back. Big arms help you counter-act the force of the ball and steer it where you need it to go.

Steroids are bad for you, period. They're not necessary either. The only reason people use them is to get ahead, right? So let's have everyone get off of them. Now they'll "get ahead" by eating better and going to the weight room more often. If that's not enough then, damn man, sometimes that's just as good as you're gonna get. That's life, and that's baseball. Not everyone needs to be the superhero. If it's not in the cards then I don't really have much sympathy. It's not like I should be allowed to cheat to get ahead in my work just because I want to make more money. ;p

Baseball would be fun to watch even without a bunch of hugely ripped steroid freaks slamming the balls. If you disagree then you really aren't a baseball fan, you should really be watching the Ultimate Fighting League or something. It's got no redeeming value and it does harm, that makes it junk. I'd happily outlaw other self-destructive drugs as well, such as tobacco, but thankfully I'm not in a position to make that decision. Steroids distort the nature of the game and essentially blackmail good, honest players into using them, or being faced with mediocrity. Sports should be about human effort and fair contest, not about duelling pharmacology labs.

[Plekhanov]

The game only suffers, IMHO, when steroid users take unfair advantage of playing in leagues dominated by non-users. I have no problem with Bonds playing in a Steroid League. I just dont want him in the NL.

And Beckett is going to kick Yankee ass tonight.

iirc they tried the separate steroid user & clean categories in body building once, it didn’t make any difference though guys in the clean category still cheated. The reason for this is fairly obvious in that the reason competitors use steroids is because they want to win at any cost even if that includes unethical behaviour and endangering their own health. People willing to do that aren’t suddenly going to roll over and play nice and follow the rules just because you create some freakish anything goes category because then all their competitors would have the same advantages.

And that’s aside from the questionable to say the least commercial viability of parallel clean & doped up leagues.

[wolveraptor]

When I watch baseball, I find it more enjoyable to see a double-play in action than an endless spree of strikeouts and homeruns. That makes the sport as boring as cricket. Watching someone make an unbelievable catch, in my opinion, is what really makes the sport worth watching.

[Count Dooku]

Who wants to bet that Count Dooku is either using steroids now or has used them in the past?

That puts me in awkward spot: if I say yes, then I will be accused of being bias. If I say no, then I'll be accused of being a moron (well, that's already happened, lol).

[Alex Moon]

Allowing steroids in professional baseball is going to gurantee that you'll see it explode even worse than it currently is at the college and high school level. A player who already beefed up in high school or college will have a serious advantage over his clean teammates, and since steroids are allowed in professional teams, scouts aren't going to care.

[Darth Wong]

Who wants to bet that Count Dooku is either using steroids now or has used them in the past?

That puts me in awkward spot: if I say yes, then I will be accused of being bias. If I say no, then I'll be accused of being a moron (well, that's already happened, lol).

Frankly, the fact that you tried to hijack this thread to discuss your outrage at any implication that steroids are bad (even taking pains to debunk statistics that you brought up YOURSELF) says to me that steroids are very important to you, which in turn makes my question an entirely rhetorical one. Your answer is not required.

[Patrick Degan]

I concede that a faster swing might help, but to what degree? Certainly not enough to warrant a major change in the players ability. The year before Bond's began his home run marathon, he switched to a new bat that was 3oz. lighter than any other bat of comparable length in the league. Why is that not also brought up!? It's certainly easy to blame steroids for a faster bat, but why not blame the bat? Since Bond's pioneered the new bat, several other players have switched the bat that they use. There is a LOT more to this entire situation than any of us are willing to admit.

Sorry, but you're talking out of your ass. Put Barry Bonds with that 3oz-lighter bat against, say, Prince Fielder (Milwaukee Brewers) with that same bat and the results will still show a disparity in swing velocity and hitting power far exceeding any wrought by the bat itself.

[Plekhanov]

Who wants to bet that Count Dooku is either using steroids now or has used them in the past?

That puts me in awkward spot: if I say yes, then I will be accused of being bias. If I say no, then I'll be accused of being a moron (well, that's already happened, lol).

Erm why would anybody accuse you of being a moron for stating that you have never taken steroids?

[haard]

Who wants to bet that Count Dooku is either using steroids now or has used them in the past?

That puts me in awkward spot: if I say yes, then I will be accused of being bias. If I say no, then I'll be accused of being a moron (well, that's already happened, lol).

Whereas now everybody just thinks you're a biased moron. Way to go.



As a side note - is steroids really legal in the states?

[Tsyroc]

They are legal by prescription for lots of legitimate health reasons.

People that are using them in the way that Barry Bonds has been accused of using them are usually getting them illegally.

I knew a guy in the Navy that was taking 'roids to help bulk up. He bought steroids in Mexico and in the UAE. Both places where you can pretty much just walk into a local pharmacy and buy them.

Some people will actually take animal steroids. Horse steroids being the one that comes to mind. A lot of times it's easier to legally obtain certain drugs or types of drugs for vetenary use.

I guy I work with who used to compete as a powerlifter would get things mail ordered from India. Incidently, this guy also thinks that people should be allowed to use steroids if they want to and he doesn't think they are that harmful.

[Count Dooku]

Frankly, the fact that you tried to hijack this thread to discuss your outrage at any implication that steroids are bad (even taking pains to debunk statistics that you brought up YOURSELF) says to me that steroids are very important to you, which in turn makes my question an entirely rhetorical one. Your answer is not required.

You are right, and I knew it from the before I even started this thread. Steroids are important to me - very important. I will say that I do not believe that steroids are nearly as dangerous as drugs like heroine, cocaine, and ecstasy, or even alcohol (at 4+ drinks a day). I've said my part, and although you all have good points, it's hardly enough to make me even consider your word as the pontificate.

[Joe]

This article ignores the fact that lots of little kids look up to baseball players, for better or worse. What kind of example does it set for a kid's role model to be a steroid-addled freak?