I‘ve had about four good Barry Bonds ideas saved up from the past couple weeks, but I wanted to wait until the San Francisco slugger broke Hank Aaron’s career homeruns record. This cartoon idea seemed the most appropriate, given that Bonds’ feat was likely aided by steroids use, forever tainting his legacy. Maybe the most important fact in this story is that millions of kids are seeing an example of a cheater getting away with it. It’s sad and ugly, and I hope Bonds feels at least some measure of shame.
I have a friend who is a veritable baseball statistician, and he believes the statistical smoking gun for steroids use lies in late-career spikes in homeruns coupled with steep declines in stolen bases. If you look at Bonds’ career stats, he goes from averaging about 30 stolen bases a season to half that number in the tail-end of the 1990s, which also coincides with his best years as a power hitter. Sad, indeed.
