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| Pictured: Kathy Hoskins and Barry Bonds |
"Barry was like, 'Just do it right here,' " she said Bonds told Anderson. "Barry just lifted his shirt up and he said: 'This is Katie. She’s my girl. She’s not going to say nothing to nobody.' "
Then Anderson gave Bonds an injection in the belly button, Hoskins testified. She said Bonds told her: "That’s a little somethin’, somethin’ when I go on the road. You can’t detect it." (New York Times, 3/31/2011)
I don't follow baseball much. I watch it casually, root for the home team (my Atlanta Braves), and abandon it by September for college football. So, I can by no means rattle off statistical facts or figures for one Barry Bonds. But, I can tell you this, I remember the great run he had in the early part of this millennia—all those homers and intentional walks were hard to miss.
He was something to see.
However, I also remember how arrogant, self-centered, and jerky he came off in the media. He was no Sammy Sosa, no Mark McGwire, and definitely no Rafael Palmeiro where the cameras were concerned. He left you feeling a bit like an idiot for worshipping his skills with a baseball bat because who wants to root for a guy who comes off like he'd just as soon spit in your face as talk to you?
Of course, in his defense, the media didn't do him any favors. The whole "he must be on steroids" debate plagued him for quite some time. He couldn't get away from the chatter about his sudden bulk, his increase in home runs, and his sudden iron man like stamina in what should have been the golden age of his career.
Then came the BALCO conversation, and other such sordid details that made you start saying to yourself, ya know, if it looks like a duck, acts like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then dammit, it has to be a duck—right?...right?
Well, true to form, as the ruling came down on Mr. Bonds head today, his fate as a future Hall of Famer seemed to take center stage as well. Now all the questions about whether he did or did not, knowingly, take performance-enhancing drugs seem irrelevant by comparison—for my money, he knew exactly what he was doing, figured he could get away with it, and was arrogant enough to still believe that until the moment before he was charged with being a liar—and the only question now is what's next for him in the court of public opinion?
In my mind, he's a cheater, but what will baseball say about him? Does he have enough goodwill anywhere to escape the fate that Mark McGwire and Rafael Palmeiro have already fallen victim to—no Hall for ya'll—or will he be able to skirt by with his 762 homers, keep his mantle as king, and find that the only time he'll serve is for not telling the truth nine years ago?
At this point, it seems a lot like nothing. This all happened so long ago now that I wonder if anybody really even cares. Yet, as a humble, and casual, observer, I hope this still matters to someone because cheating is cheating and—if Bonds is as guilty as I think he is—cheaters should never win.
