I'm horrified by the news about Barry Bonds [1].
No, not the news in the book by Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams that says that, well, Barry Bonds took Winstrol. And the Cream. And the Clear. And testosterone decanoate, sometimes known as Mexican beans. And insulin. And human growth hormone. And Clomid, used to treat female infertility. And trenbolone, used to make friggin' cattle more muscular. I'm a bit stunned at the frightful breadth of the shopping list, but I'm not surprised, exactly. In fact, if you can find a Giants fan or Bonds fan out there who is surprised, ask them to come by my house next time there's a poker game going. And bring plenty of money.
No, what horrifies me is the reason offered for why Bonds first turned to the pharmaceutical cupboard after the 1998 season: He was jealous of Mark McGwire, then dominating the headlines during his chase of Roger Maris's record.
Mark McGwire? Really?
Even in the best of times, being a baseball fan means watching your team get beat at least 60 times a year. Losing 60 times a year guarantees some of those losses are going to really hurt — a fatal error, a desperate comeback that falls just short, a reliever spits the bit. Or you wind up facing the other team's best player with everything in the balance, and he carries the day.
I've had an interesting reaction to a small number of players who've beaten us in that situation — regret, almost immediately followed by a quiet acceptance and a little dose of wonder. In such situations, I don't throw things or swear a blue streak or turn on the FAN to be reminded that there are Met fans way crazier than I am. Instead, I find myself thinking, “You know, someday I'll tell my grandchildren that I saw [Player X Who Just Beat Us] play.”
There aren't very many players in that group. The example I always use is Tony Gwynn. But Barry Bonds was in that club — and he was a member before 1999. In his first years with the Pirates you could see he was going to be something special — you knew that perfect swing, those break-the-sound-barrier-fast hands, the superb batting eye and the combination of ferocity and smarts with which he played the game would make him a superstar before long. And he became one, and then he got better in San Francisco, and when he came to town it was an event, and when he beat us, I'd think, “You know, someday I'll tell my grandchildren that I saw Barry Bonds play.”
Mark McGwire? Please. An oversized masher with a feast-or-famine bat, glued to first base, lumbering around the bases. Even before reporters starting asking questions about andro, I never gave him much thought. Did I see Mark McGwire play? Sure, kiddo. But Grandpa saw Dave Kingman and Cecil Fielder and Rob Deer play, too. What of it? (While we're on the subject, I never cared for his unctuous sidekick from the Summer of Drugs, either. Plus Sammy Sosa was a Cub.)
If you weren't careful, McGwire could hit a ball a long way and beat you. Bonds could do that too. But he could also steal bases and beat you. Or gun down your runners and beat you. McGwire seemed a nice enough guy, and genuinely passionate about abused kids, but I can't remember an interview with him that amounted to more than back-of-the-Bull-Durham-bus cliches and bromides about family. Bonds wasn't a nice guy, but on the rare occasions he felt like talking, he was funny and intriguing and very, very smart.
But wait, you say: Mark McGwire was an event in '98. Well, yeah, but not one I wanted any part of. I remember the fans who came to Shea for Mets-Cards in '98. Not many of them struck me as Mets fans, or even Cardinals fans — who are reliably inoffensive in their Midwestern way. No, the McGwire attendees were the kind of fans you see at Shea in the playoffs or for Mets-Yankees: the clueless and the bored, the ones who spend half the game on their cellphones and eat their one hot dog at arm's length from whatever expensive nonballpark attire they have on, the ones who give you the gimlet eye if you ask them not to stand up throughout another inning and seem vaguely affronted that their chatter has to compete with discussions of the actual game. Long home runs were the fad that summer, but the folks who came to Shea to see them would have been equally happy to watch, say, cockfighting or demolition derby. Later, Bonds would attract these idiots too — but then that's part of the tragedy of Barry Bonds.
Yep, I called it a tragedy. I'll go further, in fact: Barry Bonds is the stuff of Shakespearean tragedy. A man who grew up in baseball clubhouses, whose godfather was Willie Mays, who saw his father's career derailed by alcohol and a bad reputation, one that may or may not have been earned. Who then surpassed his father in every respect, something that can't have been simple or easy for one proud, defiant man raised by another. A man I'd call the greatest player of his generation — and who was that before 1999. A man who was one of the greatest players in baseball history — before 1999. A man who was in the I'll-tell-my-grandkids-I-saw-him-play club — before 1999. Barry Bonds was great before you could buy great in a syringe or an ointment or something to stick under your tongue. And he destroyed all of it because he was jealous of Mark McGwire?
Mark McGwire! Destined to be remembered for a virtual-asterisked single season, who showed up before a congressional panel looking shrunken and lost, and took a match to his reputation in a few shameful minutes of pathetic ducking and weaving. Mark McGwire's name should have been all but forgotten while Bonds's was still mentioned in awe, and now, because Barry Bonds somehow didn't realize or didn't care that he was already the kind of player Mark McGwire could only dream of being, the two of them will be linked forever. Sure, Bonds took that home-run record away. Fat lot of good it will do him now.
There are steroids in baseball? Not news to me — hell, there's a Met or two whom I strongly suspect knew his way around the business end of a syringe.
Barry Bonds is a jerk of the first order? I don't particularly care — I think I'd be unhappy to find out how many players are.
The greatest player of his generation burned down his own legacy because he wanted the attention given to a bottle-bred circus freak by a cynical sport and its dimwitted pretend fans? I do care about that. In fact, it makes me furious. What a waste. What an absolutely infuriating, frustrating, confounding, horrifying, tragic waste.