I’ve been incredibly happy these past few days, and for a very obvious reason: Barry Bonds was indicted on 4 counts of perjury and 1 count of obstruction of justice. Now, I’m not one to wish ill on anybody, but this is pretty great news, if you ask me.
Over the past years, baseball has suffered of a little something called the ‘Steroid Era’. It has affected the sport all the way around; it’s changed the way the players go about their business; it’s changed the way the managers play their guys and it’s even affected the sport directly, altering the game itself with the addition of more stats (WHIP, holds, saves, etc.) and more “positions” (relievers—set-up men, closers). These substances have been used by a whole lot of players, more than you can imagine, I’m sure. Steroids have spread in the Majors like pinkeye in Preschool. I’d go as far as to say that more than half of the players in the MLB right now have used at least one of the now banned substances at least once and some point in their lives.
It’s very easy to use steroids, it’s harder to get away with it, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do it. These days, you got all kinds of substances at reach, and, sure, testing has gotten harder to beat, but there’ll always be the little tricks and, of course, the “natural” stuff, like HGH. The Human Growth Hormone is what you could say is “in” right now with the players. Even if you can detect it medically, the MLB has still to get its hands on some truly effective tests to do this. So, for now, it’s what some players are relying on.
There’s all sorts of things you can do to beat the system, and, apparently, Barry Bonds has done’em all. We all know his story, we all know his relationship with Greg Anderson, yet there are still those who are convinced he has never used steroids, even with all the signs there. Well, kiddies, that is all over and done with now.
How did this come about to happening? Well, one gorgeous day, Bonds stood under oath and said, “I have never knowingly used steroids” and four years later, he broke Hank Aaron’s lifetime home run record, becoming our Home Run King—for now. Well, that day, with that sentence, Barry Bonds killed his career (and now, possibly, his future).
The FBI started looking into Bonds and a few other players, I might add (Jason Grimsley, anyone?), and even if they had nothing that was juicy enough to bust him, they did caught up with some good info on his trainer, Greg Anderson, that was enough to put the latter away for illegally distributing steroids. Now, the Feds say Barry Bonds lied when he said he “never knowingly” juiced which means he’s in deep, deep trouble.
Bonds’ days of getting away with everything and anything are over; you can’t play with the FBI (or can you, OJ?). Each count of perjury amounts for up to 5 years and the one count of obstruction of justice goes as high as 10, totaling for 30 years. And that’s not even where it ends: what will happen to the record?
I have to say that I was waiting for this to happen, I knew it would, I just never in a million years thought it would be just a few months after the record was broken. I do think that Bonds juiced, but I wanted him to break the record, simply because I wanted to see just what would happen when he did. I really wanted to see what the reaction would be when Barry’s steroid use was officially proven to be true. And if the FBI says it has proof—proof enough to finally take him to court after four years, then that day is finally here. There’s no need to rush into things, but the Commissioner should really start thinking about what will happen to Barry Bonds’ record. I’m sure most of us would agree that it should be taken away, it’s the right thing to do, but we can’t call it until we see it, now can we?
