Unlike Babe Ruth, Bonds wins few hearts

By Leonard Anderson

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Even as he powered past Babe Ruth
on the all-time Major League Baseball home run list, Barry
Bonds has not garnered the admiration and adoration enjoyed by
Ruth and past legends in the game.

Bonds’s milestone 715th career home run on Sunday against
the Colorado Rockies lifted the controversial San Francisco
Giants outfielder above Ruth for No. 2 behind Hank Aaron’s 755.

The National League’s seven-time Most Valuable Player is at
the center of baseball’s steroid scandal, drawing as much media
attention to his legal battles and grand jury investigations as
his towering home runs.

The steroid row as well as the Bonds’ poor personal
reputation have made him unpopular among many who follow the
American pastime.

“Bonds is an odious human being,” veteran New York Times
sports columnist George Vecsey wrote on May 2. “At first, I
found myself actively rooting against Bonds because he is a
churl (and not just to the press; he is actively miserable
toward most people).”

According to his lawyer, Bonds told a federal grand jury
investigating the BALCO drug lab that he never knowingly used
steroids but he is now under a grand jury probe for possible
perjury. His personal trainer has already served a brief prison
sentence from a steroid distribution conviction in the scandal.
Bonds has never failed a steroid test.

Baseball’s drug scandal also has tarnished the careers of
Mark McGwire, Jason Giambi, Sammy Sosa, Gary Sheffield and
Rafael Palmeiro, although only Palmeiro has tested positive for
performance-enhancing drugs.

CONGRESS PUSHES COMMISSIONER

Baseball Commissioner Bud Selig, pushed by the U.S.
Congress to get tough on performance-enhancing drugs, has
ordered a probe into steroid use, headed by former U.S. Sen.
George Mitchell, who has brokered peace efforts in Northern
Ireland and the Middle East.

Baseball did not ban performance-enhancing drugs until
after the 2002 season, one season after Bonds hit an all-time
single-season record 73 home runs.

While Bonds has been jeered and cursed at away games this
season, he has been given hero treatment at home by adoring
Giants fans at AT&T Park, where many of his home run balls have
splashed down into San Francisco Bay.

Older fans watched his late father play for the Giants at
the old Candlestick Park. Bobby Bonds, a power hitting
outfielder from 1968-1974, hit 332 home runs in his career.

Bonds’s other tight link to the team’s glory is his
godfather, Giants center fielder Willie Mays, regarded by many
as the greatest all-around player in the history of the game
and the fourth leading home run slugger with 660.

Asked about Bonds and steroids, Mays told the San Francisco
Chronicle: “Let’s move on. Let him play. Let him have fun.
He’ll be better off if they let him alone for a while. But
that’s not going to happen.”

Born in 1964 in Riverside, California, Bonds started his
Major League career with the Pittsburgh Pirates in the 1986
season. He joined the Giants in 1993.

Some observers doubt that the 41-year-old Bonds will
eclipse Aaron’s record this season or even play next year. He
missed most of last season recovering from three knee surgeries
and is limping noticeably this spring.

As Bonds neared Ruth’s landmark, he wrote on his Web site:
“Right now, my focus is on winning a World Series with my team.
If I reach Hank’s record, it would be an honor, but again, my
focus is on winning games with my team.”

The Giants have not won the World Series since 1954.