My Arguments for Barry Bonds

[omahilo]

Bonds also DENIED using steroids after saying that stuff to the grand jury that he had to know was going to come out eventually.

[parskynhutch]

How could steroids not have had an impact on his hitting? He hits 73 dingers at age 37? He's constantly hitting 45+ since?

[Kidd7138]

"First, and it is true, he is playing against pitchers that are also juiced up. In the days of Ruth and Maris guys would be throwing 70-90 MPH fastballs, today they are in the mid 90s, often throwing 3 or four other pitches to complement their blazing fastballs."

I think you're seriously overstating the difference in pitchers repertoire's from the early days of baseball to today. Pitchers weren't throwing 75 mph heaters back in the day, and steroids is not the kind of thing that would magically add 5-10 mph on somebody's fastball, pitchers use them more for injury recovery and to delay the aging process which a pitcher's arm goes through. Offensive feats from guys like Maris in the 60's and surrounding time periods are impressive because that was a period absolutely dominated by pitching.

"Cubs fans know that Sosa hits the most useless home runs in the world. He may get 60 in a season but 40 of them are when the games are 10-0."

I really hope you don't actually believe that Sammy Sosa hit 2/3 of his home runs in largely meaningless situations.

[Chutups]

Bonds already openly admitted to useing steroids, even though he says he didn't know. Why would you need to defend him when he's already admitted he's used steroids.

I think Bonds is a great player, but if he really did used sterods knowingly he really needs to be punished. It's unfair to those in the game who don't cheat.

Baseball is getting a lot of heat from the media and fans, I have a feeling that Baseball is going to get more strict with this whole sterod issue.

[TajaUk]

You will NEVER clean up baseball until the players dont hold all the Aces! They themselves wont allow random drug tests. Blame all the players for hiding exactly how many of them do drugs,.

[Baseballa19]

Just to clear up a misconception. Pitchers today DO NOT throw harder than those in previous eras. Despite everything you see on television today, it is a FACT that less than 10 percent of today's big league pitchers CONSISTANTLY throw 90+ mph. You can't rely on the speed figures given by the networks or those in big league ball parks. They are WAY high. I've seen Tom Glavine pitch on television where he was said to have been consistantly at 90-91 with his fastball. Glavine hasn't thrown a pitch above 89 in years. Why would they do this? The same reason that balls are juiced and players are too. The public wants high numbers. They pay for high numbers.

Bonds taking steroids is an afront to the integrity of the game, but the buying public doesn't care. They want too see home runs. Why do you think most new ball parks are smaller? Why did baseball take away the pitcher's edge after the most dominating pitching year in history (1968)? Because the public wants offense. What we're seeing may not be the same game, but it's pretty exciting. Taco Bell isn't even close to real Mexican food, but DAMN I love those burritos!

[eddo31]

while it is true that the hardest throwing pitchers today dont throw much harder than those in the past, the sheer number of pitchers that trow 90+ no wis staggering, and it is much higher than 10%. and no, i dont believe the fox guns either. steroids can aid pitchers just as much as they can aid hitters, and they are expected to add 3-4 mph to a fastball, which is a very significant increase.

i am really waffling on bonds. while i am not sure that what he did is an affront to the game, i dont like how he handled the situation. he knew that he was taking roids, and he lied to a grand jury about it. at least giambi came clean.

the real villain here that will likely go unexposed are the owners. they knew that a large percentage of players were on the juice, and yet they did nothing to stop it. home runs sell tickets, and the owners could care less about the long term helth of the players or the game. all they care about is their wallet, and they are too shortsighted to think about the long run damage done by a scandal like this