Stuff to See!

Thunk!!

That's the sound of the other shoe dropping.
Two number 25s have hit the news recently admitting to steroid use in major league baseball. The first was Jason Giambi, a man who looked to become one of the scary greats of the 21st century. The second, and far more damning, was Barry Bonds. Anyone who reads this will no doubt already know the basics: Giambi and Bonds admitted under oath, under threat of perjury, that they used steroids.
This news came from a leak of testimony in the BALCO investigation many moons ago that has just come to light in the San Francisco Chronicle. In other words, this didn't just happen yesterday.
Giambi's testimony was very frank. He went into graphic detail about how and where he injected himself with steroids and human growth hormone (the latter not yet banned in baseball). The link this drug use had to Giambi's poor health in 2004 has yet to be etched in stone, but in this case, circumstance may prove to be damning even if the causal relations remain unclear. I have no idea, although a tumor around the pituitary gland, an organ intrinsically connected with the distribution of hormones, doesn't look good. At any rate, this much is certain: he did it, and he owned up to it.
Giambi was monstrously good from 2000-2003 before falling off the map in 2004. The drop off in quality may be related to coming off of steroids (the weight loss, the downward plunge in effectiveness), and it may not. The tendinitis he suffered in 2003 may be related to steroid use, and it may not. Is Giambi a great player, or did he become great by illicit means? I don't know yet.
What I do know is that every inch of his career has now been tainted by the admission made many moons ago. His career is now in jeopardy, pending the parsing done by contract lawyers over the ins and outs of Giambi's deal.
Has 40 million dollars been worth it? How many millions need be added or pared away before integrity and honesty play a role in one's decisions? For some, the amount is small. For others, a wide world of wealth is worth any price. But I don't blame him.
Bonds' testimony was more circumspect. He admitted to taking something very similar to what Giambi knew to be steroids. He thought it was flax seed oil and arthritic balm or some such stuff. Plausible deniability. He may be 100 percent honest, or he may not. Prove it one way or the other, and I'll show you a green dog.
Bonds' admission put his recent numbers under the same taint as Giambi's, only on a much greater scale. Where Giambi was one of a few hundred players who set the world on fire for a few years, Bonds has done things others have never done. The 73 home runs, the 232 walks, the .600+ on base percentage, the way he took a team of relative nobodies and came within striking distance of the playoffs, the way YOU JUST KNOW (TM) that something unbelievable is going to happen when he's at the plate (such as boos from the fans of the other team), Bonds is one of a kind.
And how much of it came from steroids? That's the question for which no one will have an answer good enough to set this issue straight. I've shared my thoughts on this before:

Does he fall from the category of truly great to just great? Is he blacklisted like Pete Rose (a true scoundrel, but a very good player for a very long time, who was in no way connected to steroids, even if he broke baseball's cardinal rule against gambling, but still one of the greats on the field). Certainly his name would be smeared, but I don't think his talent would fall so much from what we see today. The man is a lethal combination of talent and intelligence on the diamond. I hope his name is cleared, so we can give him the respect his deeds deserve. If, on the other hand, he's guilty, then his deeds, while still remarkable, will bear the stain of his actions.

To paraphrase Bill James, if you were to split Bonds in two, you'd have two first-ballot Hall of Famers. That, of course, assumes that the steroid issue was just the rumor and black cloud that has followed Bonds for years now. Even if you discount half of Bonds' numbers as coming from steroids, he's still a great player. How many of the seven MVP trophies and the 700 home runs can one take away even with concrete, year by year analyses of drug use?
Bonds is the best of this generation, and in being so, the biggest and easiest target. Perhaps it's fitting that he also be the one to wear the largest scarlet S. Then again, many people painted that letter on him before any of this news broke. Although there's sound and fury concerning the confirmation, very little has changed. Even if he is 'the best, but', he's still the best. Even if the clouds have darkened and the taint of now-confirmed drug use has become more indelible, the facts remain the facts. How one interprets those facts hasn't changed from December 1st to December 3rd, except that one or two new facts have been added.
Regardless of whether his plausible deniability is real or feigned, I don't blame him.
Like Giambi, or Gary Sheffield, or Benito Santiago, or Jeremy Giambi (how the hell did steroids help him), or Jose Canseco, or Ken Caminiti (rest in peace), they pursued the almighty dollar, that green god who smiles upon deeds of greatness in the world of sports, as well as fame, history. Who are the judges of this greatness? People like me, people who love this game and love to see (and sometimes love to hate) these overpaid adults making a child's game look like child's play.
Who would I be to demonize the megastars who have come out by whatever means and said they have used steroids? Why do I go to the stadium to watch a game others may find too boring for words?
I wasn't alone in wondering whether Bonds would hit the warehouse at Camden Yards.
I wasn't alone when I marveled at the feats of McGwire and Sosa in 1998 and 1999.
I wasn't alone when I was amazed at how quickly and easily Bonds blew the new record away.
So who would I be to cry foul at this point?
I'd be the one sitting at his iMac, trying to put this in perspective. Cheating is nothing new. Sammy Sosa got caught with a corked bat. Do a web search about Hal Chase. Watch Eight Men Out. Hell, even Babe Ruth cheated once or twice. Steal some signs, turn on the fans at the Metrodome. Paint your chalk lines higher, spread out the mound, bring on the spitball, the scuffball, and even the tobacco ball. Do a few lines of coke, snort some speed, bring it on. It's been there and done. Cheating is part of the game. What's the difference here? The fact that people are killing themselves in the long run in an attempt to win, or to make more money, isn't really news. The faces and means are different, but the idea is the same.