Should they take away his HR record?

[Bluefish]

Barry Bonds' home run record, I mean. I saw him tie the record live here in San Diego and applauded....it was an incredible feat regardless of whatever he was on.

But it didn't feel right....like my hands hurt after clapping a few times, the way they do when something tells you the adulation isn't totally sincere.

Now first off...Bonds is not O.J. Simpson--not even CLOSE. Difference, pun intended, between apples and oranges here.

[poolman]

I think Bonds has been on steroids for years.

[Bluefish]

I think Bonds has been on steroids for years.

Seems to have started around 2000 - 2001. According to Wikipedia (look under "Resurgence") "In 2000, at age 36, Bonds hit .306, with a slugging percentage of .688 (career best at that time), hit 49 home runs in just 143 games (also a career high to that point), while drawing a league-leading 117 walks.

"The next year, Bonds' offensive production reached even higher levels, breaking not only his own personal records but several major league records. In the Giants' first 50 games in 2001, Bonds hit 28 home runs, including 17 in May—a career high. He also hit 39 home runs by the All-star break (a major league record), drew a major league record 177 walks, and had a .515 on-base average, a feat not seen since Mickey Mantle and Ted Williams over forty years earlier. Bonds' slugging percentage was a major league record .863 (411 total bases in 476 at-bats), and, most impressively, he ended the season with a major league record 73 home runs."

The press also noted that he was putting on an unusual amount of muscle.

[Theo!]

They should take it away, if for no other reason than to make a statement that juicing won't be rewarded, and will in fact disqualify you from receiving such awards.

[steamy]

Ditto Theo!

He use to be a 190 lb base stealer, if they test thoroughbred winners after every race, maybe we ought to make HR hitters pee in a cup....I love baseball, etc. Let's end this steroid trend, it is not that hard to figure out how, test positive & you are OUT!!!!!

[poolman]

I agree Steamy! How can these players get by using steroids and not be tested?

[willowtree]

Player's union is very strong.

A week ago, I might have argued against taking away his record. Maybe an asterisk by his name in the record book. It wasn't proven that he did anything wrong, and he was a formidable player with or without steroids, even though he seemed like a jerk. I don't think he was using during the last two years given the amount of scrutiny he was under, and he still got 'er done.

But given the lies, the testimony that he did indeed test positive - at the VERY least put the asterisk next to his name, but better yet, take his name off the books.

[Mark..]

Should Floyd Landis have been stripped of the yellow jersey?

Marion Jones forced to turn over her medals?

@#$%@ YEAH Bonds should be stripped of the title! Period.

Just my opinion ... or why play games about drug enhancement? Just let everything be legal OR enforce the rules.

[PoignéeUnique]

IMCO (In My Correct Opinion), Bonds should go to jail for perjury but keep his home run records. Should his single-season record revert to Mark McGuire? Who's next in that line? Look, it's Sammy Sosa, who did Steroids AND corked bats.

As for the career record, inasmuch as I think Henry Aaron is - morally speaking - a more desirable choice, he is nonetheless a less deserving choice, since he never faced as many juiced pitchers as Bonds, but also never had to carry a giant head around the bases.

[BriarRose]

Why would anyone care whether or not an entertainer takes drugs? It's on level with those who follow Britnney Spears. You don't like it don't watch and don't buy.

[kara.]

If I'm incorrect, I'm sure someone will enlighten me, but Major League Baseball did not have strict rules regarding testing and steroids during the years Bonds was using them...and ditto PU (I do prefer your old acronym!) that other players would need to be "asterisked" too. Should MLB have had tougher rules and testing?, yes, but they didn't, and what happened, happened, and was by no means limited to BB. Cycling and Olympic track and field do have strict rules and testing...therefore Landis and Marion Jones.

I think there is a certain amount of racism in the focus on BB vs. other players here, though I'm not a fan of roids or perjury. He's a black man with a bad attitude towards the press and fandom...so he should be punished. Maybe, but so should others then.

[Joline]

If he keeps his records I believe they should let Pete Rose into the Hall of Fame.

IMHO

[Joline]

.....and for the record, I was a Red Sox fan in 1975.......

[Bluefish]

Hm. Maybe there should be a new Hall of fame for those people who took performance enhancing drugs but despite having done so, managed to accomplish incredible physical feats.

A sort of Big Pharma Hall of Phame.

When I lived near D.C. I used to take the kids to the greatest free museums in the (duh) free world. We even found a little one we decided to call the "Bezore Museum." It was located on the grounds of Walter Reed Army Hospital. It had all kinds of really odd historical artifacts; not the kind that would be in the more prestigious Smithsonian Museum of American History on the Mall.

Bezore? That was one of the artifacts--a human hairball the size of a softball that a surgeon had taken out of some poor soldier's stomach. And a lot more things like that that my boys just ate up (well...).

So let's have a Bezore Museum like that for athletes who have done incredible things on drugs.