Barry Bonds and the Cheating Elite

Barry Bonds of the San Francisco Giants becoming baseball's all-time home run hitter this week brought a number of interesting reactions from fellow players, which illustrated a wide chasm in opinion between the athletes and most fans.

Bonds, of course, has been dogged for several years now by allegations that he has abused steroids or other performance-enhancing drugs. While he's never publicly tested positive for banned substances, the incredible increase in his physical size and strength in the late-1990s cannot be easily explained away. Plus, early in his career, his annual home run totals were in the 20s and 30s, which later evolved into consistent 40-plus homer seasons. The difference in his season-by-season home run statistics is not as dramatic as some would have you believe, but the increase coming in what would be the twilight of most careers is unusual.

Opposing players appeared to be matter-of-fact about Bonds when quoted after the record-breaking home run, or openly supportive. Arizona 2B Orlando Hudson applauded when he saw a highlight on the Chase Field video screen, Ryan Garko of the Indians said it was "sick" (good), and White Sox catcher A.J. Pierzynski said he was happy Bonds broke the record. Nary a negative comment could be heard.

Contrast that with the reaction of fans and the media. The people who watched Hudson's game in Phoenix booed, as did those in Denver. In San Diego, when Bonds tied the record last Saturday, there was much polite applause and a significant smattering of boos. The media has skewered Bonds for years, and a reporter actually asked him after he took a telephone call from President Bush whether Bush mentioned the federal investigation into a Bay Area lab (BALCO) that allegedly produced the performance enhancing substances.

No question, the players were being on their best behavior on a night that a cherished record was broken. Just about everything about the moment has been handled in a classy manner.

But there's a big difference in the way the players feel and the way the rest of us think. The players are all applauding a record. The rest of us are suspicious about the player who broke it.

Much of this is inside baseball, literally. Performance enhancing drugs has impacted other sports, most notably football, track and field, and bicycle racing. In those three other sports, however, so many of the participants do it that the competitive nature of the game is not altered to a significant degree. Baseball, however, is a much different game than it was in the 1970s and early-1980s, when pitching and speed were the key. The long ball has been king ever since, and in a lot of ways, the quality of the game has suffered. While it's not as bad as it was a few years ago, baseball fans have suffered through a lot of oafs who could hit the ball into the seats but couldn't make an accurate throw to the cutoff man or lay down a bunt.

Baseball players and management slough off the cheating allegations, but they're really symptomatic of a large problem facing society today, the willingness of many to cheat to get ahead. In a sense, baseball is no better than Enron or the GOP congress of that was tossed out in 2006. The ends justify the means. How we get ahead is not as important as how high we go. Meanwhile, civilization loses its sense of humanity and values.

What's crazy is we had no idea that anything was wrong with Enron until the scandal broke with sudden ferocity. The congressional scandals slowly unfolded and we only recently learned the true nature of Randy "Duke" Cunningham's corruption.

Baseball? We KNOW there's a problem. We've KNOWN of the problem for several years now. We all have our favorite suspects. Yet, we fans only express our disgust by booing Barry and grunting with co-workers at the water cooler. That's why baseball has moved at a glacial pace to fix the scandal within its game, and why the players and we the people have such divergent opinions on a cherished record that may, or may not, be tainted.

Immigration Racism

One of the most disturbing facets of the immigration reform debate was the racism charge that was so casually cast about by supporters of the failed bill, from Ted Kennedy to John McCain and even hinted at by President Bush.

The people who tried to ram this horrible bill through Congress are so insulated, so out of touch with reality, that they truly believe their opponents recoil at the sight of Latinos. But the truth is far different.

What prompts this blog entry is the starting lineup of Major League Baseball's American League All-Star team. David Ortiz is at first base, with Placido Palanco at second. You probably see where I'm going here. While Derek Jeter is the shortstop, the third baseman is Alex Rodriguez, Magglio Ordonez is in left, Vladimir Guerrero is in right and Ivan Rodriguez is catching. If not for Jeter and center fielder Ichiro Suzuki, you'd have an all-Hispanic lineup.

The key here is that all these players were voted as starters by the fans. The American public. And baseball has quite a cross-section of followers over the socio-political-economic spectrum. In the middle of a heated debate over whether to let 12 million illegal immigrants become citizens, the people of the United States voted six Latino ballplayers to the All-Star Game for the AL. And while two are not Hispanic, one is Japanese and the other mixed-race. No white starters. The National League added two more Latino starters, and fans of the senior circuit nearly selected Cubs pitcher Carlos Zambrano over the far more deserving Chris Young, the Padres hurler, in the Internet balloting for the final roster spot.

You can just feel the racial hatred simmering in this country.

Seriously, you can't get a real feel for what's happening on this subject -- or many others, for that matter -- by isolating yourself in Washington, D.C., or midtown Manhattan. In Southern California, Texas, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, we've been living with Latinos for our entire lives. We know what it's like. You hear all kinds of things about them, such as whether they assimilate. Like just about every other ethnic group that's come here, some of them do and some don't. In a courthouse where I often work, Latinos are heavily represented among the criminals, the bailiffs, the cops, the prosecutors, the defense attorneys and the judges. It's across the board.

Some Latinos become baseball players, and can be very talented ones. As fans, no matter our race or their's, we appreciate their skills and enjoy watching them. Race is a non-issue. It was during the immigration debate, too. Unfortunately, our unethical and ineffectual leaders played the race card because they just couldn't bring themselves to admit that they were trying to swindle the public with their bill.