Barry Bonds

Um, many have tried to reinstate Pete Rose as well, and his issue was gambling. Who cares if he takes or took steroids, is it really our business? If they want to ruin their health to be a better player, let them, IMO.

Real, being someone who golfs and plays baseball, I can honestly say strength/steroids would help a TON more in baseball than golf. Every time you make contact in baseball, power helps. Fly balls turn into homeruns, line drives are that much more likely to be hits, and grundballs find gaps much more easily. In golf, on the other hand, you may gain 15 yards, but that still means you have to hit a shot with great accuracy, and steroids are definitely not going to help you hit a 9 iron with consistency.

And how can you say that many homeruns is more impressive now, when all you need to do is look at the other hitters of their respective era's to see that that's clearly not the case. In Aaron's era, homerun leaders consistently had around the low-mid 40's in hr's, with the occasional 50 along with the occasional 30's. Nowadays, homerun leaders tend to average around the mid-50's, with a rare 40's leader every once in a while, and of course your occasional 60's or 70. So clearly the modern era possesses a much greater amount of homeruns to be had compared to Aarons era.

Fly balls turn into home runs? No. If you contact the ball in the same spot it just turns into a higher fly ball. Only those few that go to the warning track turn into home runs.

And I dont need to bring up swings like A Rod or Griffey for evidence do I? They barely swing and consistantly hit alot of home runs. Its not like they are powering it, its great technique with only the nessicary power needed.

Plus Aaron played 23 seasons. Thats only an average of 33 per season. Barry is in his 22nd season. If you dont count the season before Barry hit 73, in which he hit 49 - he was on pace for an average of 32 homers a season. The years in which you would assume he roided up he is averaging 38 homers a season. Definatly NOT a huge jump and would still be within the numbers you speak of from back in the day.

I would argue that number of home runs has increased due too increased demand for star players. As I said before, many kids are raised to be superstar atheletes. This wasnt the case even 20, or 30 years ago. With sports being such a high priority in todays culture and the technology helping kids to grow up in top human form - its no wonder the HR leaders are 10 or so more a year.


But Barrys production didnt sky rocket and hes not hitting grossly larger numbers than Aaron was. Look at the stats.

That was my point Real. Bonds isnt hitting grossly larger numbers than Aaron, despite the fact that his era as a whole is hitting more homeruns on average. That makes his achievement much less impressive if you ask me, especially if he was in fact taking steroids. And in saying fly balls turn into homeruns, I of course meant long fly balls, obviously if you're flying out to the shortstop roids arent going to turn that into a homerun.

And he had a pretty convincing increase in homeruns, considering suddenly hes consistently hitting 10 more hr's per year on average despite getting progressively fewer at bats.

But alot of players have gone from 20 to 30 and stayed there.

But my point was mostly that humans are BRED from birth to be athletic machines. Its perfectly normal that more people hit the long ball and hit it more often. I think whats more impressive is they HIT these homeruns off of pitchers who throw some of the nastiest balls and throw the hardest and fastest speeds in history. Its not like they are hitting home runs off the pitchers of Aarons era - no, these guys, just like the hitters are far more advanced humanly.

Just look at the amount of weight training and the amount of nutritional knowledge weve gained since Aaron. I still dont think hes doing anything thats OMFG and I dont think, if he even took roids, that it helped him so much that without them he wouldnt have broken the record.


If it wasnt for the year he hit 5 HR's and was gone most of the year, we would have had this discussion like 2 years ago.

Barry Bonds is still a great athlete. There is no evidence to state he is on steroids ... so tell me, why are we having this discussion again? Seriously guys, leave the guy alone. Unless someone here is in a position of authority in the National Baseball League and can give an informed view on why he should be counted out. If not, then seriously, if he wants to ruin his health let him.
No one is asking you to take an injection or a pill, so let it be.

We are having this discussion because people are naturally assuming that a black man (let me emphasize his race importance down the line..) is beating everyone at hitting HomeRuns and he is about to break a record which is also held by a black man.

When Aaron broke the record everyone was scared to death and was pissed almost because a black man was breaking a white mans record in a day and age where race was the biggest importance of almost anything.

People didn't even heard of Barry until he hit 73 home runs, a record which was set in '98 by a white man who was the steroid god of the time. People at the time of Barry's setting record assumed that in order to break a record from a doper, he had to be one himself.

The fact that Barry is black doesn't help him at all because people in this country are still prejudiced, because of what a country we were only 50 years ago. It is still in the minds of people. So that isn't helping Barry what so ever, because it is still somewhat implanted in everyone's brain that Blacks don't belong, at this current time we are experiencing the prejudice of the 50s not in race but in sexual preference. There are plenty of people here who I know believe it is completely wrong for two people of the same sex to be with each other because it isnt natural.

On topic, Barry has assumed to be a doper because it is a widely believed fact that BigMac doped too. In order to pass 70, you have to dope up. It also hasn't helped Bonds what so ever that he is the fastest person from 400 to 500, 500 to 600, and 600 to 700. Hitting 30 or so home runs in his 40s is also unrealistic by the standards everyone has. History tells people that they are in their prime until 35, than sharply go down hill. Bonds is defying that, so it is a natural assumption that he is getting some help.

Anywho, not to ramble, we are having this discussion for no reason. People in this country generally love to talk and think about who is cheating and with what.

On top of that, its baseball, boring...

Originally posted by ragan

We are having this discussion because people are naturally assuming that a black man (let me emphasize his race importance down the line..) is beating everyone at hitting HomeRuns and he is about to break a record which is also held by a black man.

When Aaron broke the record everyone was scared to death and was pissed almost because a black man was breaking a white mans record in a day and age where race was the biggest importance of almost anything.

People didn't even heard of Barry until he hit 73 home runs, a record which was set in '98 by a white man who was the steroid god of the time. People at the time of Barry's setting record assumed that in order to break a record from a doper, he had to be one himself.

The fact that Barry is black doesn't help him at all because people in this country are still prejudiced, because of what a country we were only 50 years ago. It is still in the minds of people. So that isn't helping Barry what so ever, because it is still somewhat implanted in everyone's brain that Blacks don't belong, at this current time we are experiencing the prejudice of the 50s not in race but in sexual preference. There are plenty of people here who I know believe it is completely wrong for two people of the same sex to be with each other because it isnt natural.

On topic, Barry has assumed to be a doper because it is a widely believed fact that BigMac doped too. In order to pass 70, you have to dope up. It also hasn't helped Bonds what so ever that he is the fastest person from 400 to 500, 500 to 600, and 600 to 700. Hitting 30 or so home runs in his 40s is also unrealistic by the standards everyone has. History tells people that they are in their prime until 35, than sharply go down hill. Bonds is defying that, so it is a natural assumption that he is getting some help.

Anywho, not to ramble, we are having this discussion for no reason. People in this country generally love to talk and think about who is cheating and with what.

On top of that, its baseball, boring...

True ... yet their pee keeps coming up clean. Come on, we gotta go deeper than that. Just because some have been found to be using steroids, it does not mean that everyone does it. Especially when medical science (ya know, that thing that so many here tote as the only real thing) cannot prove that they use drugs. It just makes no sense.

As far as the race thing ... meh ... down here in Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia that is still a small thing in certain small groups - even though there is only ONE team in the league from those three states (Braves). But as for the rest of the country being afraid of a black man breaking a record ... have you seen the #2 Democratic Presidential hopeful?



Sorry, but using the logic that people are freaking out because he is black just does not hold water in this discussion.

I agree though, it's baseball .... meh.

nascar is for rednecks, leave it up to them to decide wether that is a popular sport.

[jayman]

this is how little i know about sports.. until i saw this thread i didn't know bonds was black...

^ and ^^ [lol]

By the way, Barry broke a bat but not the record today.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/b ... ml?cnn=yes

Originally posted by ragan
Hitting 30 or so home runs in his 40s is also unrealistic by the standards everyone has. History tells people that they are in their prime until 35, than sharply go down hill. Bonds is defying that, so it is a natural assumption that he is getting some help.

But I think thats a bunch of bull. Medicine, nutrition and technology allow athletes to be better longer - without doping.

Hank Aaron played till he was 42. After he turend 35 he hit 245 more home runs over 8 years averaging 30.6. If it werent for his last 3 years, he was averaging almost 40.


So maybe everyone has these "standards" but they arent grounded in any truth. If people would just go look at the stats and such they arent all that off of Bonds.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2007/b ... ml?cnn=yes

Bonds ties Hank Aaron's record to a mixture of cheers and other nonsense, to include the Commissioner acting like it is no big deal. Classy ... real classy Mr. Selig (not).