Barry Bonds

[Ferdinand]

Originally Posted by King Glorious

I sure hope weight gain and increase in size from 22 to 36 isn't what clearly makes someone guilty of steroid use. If so, mark me down as guilty too cause I'm a lot bigger than I was then.

People don't look at everything. Bonds came to SF in 1993 and played there in Candlestick Park through the 1999 season. In his first six seasons there, he hit 235 home runs in 888 games. I didn't use the 1999 season because that's the one that he allegedly started using steroids. The point is that in his first six years in SF, he hit an average of 39.2 home runs per season in 148.0 games per season. To allege that he didn't start hitting home runs until he started using steroids is wrong. There has been one season that was an outlier for him and that was the 73 hr season. I showed in another thread where even if he had only hit 35 per season after his alleged use started, instead of the 45+ he was hitting, he still would be close to the 700 mark anyway and averaging 35 a season wouldn't have been a stretch. Aaron and Ruth did it during comparative age years so why couldn't Bonds have? Also, consider the fact that in 2000, they moved to another park, one where the right field fence is 19 feet closer than at Candlestick. That surely has helped his cause too. If one wants to allege that he started beginning with the 1999 season and that he's added an average of 10 hr's a season to what he would have been getting, go ahead and take off 80. Hell, take off 100. That would put him at 651. But then also consider that he only played 113 games in his rookie season, only 112 in the strike year of 1994, only 102 in 1999, only 130 in 2003, only 14 in 2005 and only 130 in 2006. Give him some of those games back and it's very easy to see how he could be at or beyond 700 right now. Hell, u want to take off 200 because of steroids? Fine. Put him at 551 now. But then give him back 360 games that he missed during those years I mentioned. That's just over two years. Give him the 35 per season average and that's 70 hr's. U could take away 200 hr's from steriods and the guy could still be over 600. No matter how u want to look at it, he's one of the greatest hr hitters in the history of the game. That is a fact.

No doubt he was one of the best all around players in the game. That's why it makes me even more sick that he would take steroids (My opinion) in order to gain even more of an advantage.

Great lesson for the kids!