Results tagged ‘ Barry Bonds ’
“Slimmed-down” Barry Bonds wants a job with the Giants
By Matthew Pouliot @ Hardball Talk
CSNBayArea.com’s Paul Gutierrez reports that Barry Bonds showed up at AT&T Park on Monday and said he’s talked with Giants CEO Larry Baer about a job with the club, likely as a roving instructor.
Bonds, five years removed from the end of his playing days, spoke with reporters for a half hour outside of the Giants clubhouse and talked about his future as well as his newest hobby, cycling.
He said he currently weighs about 212-215 pounds after recent surgeries on his lower back and hip.
Bonds is currently appealing last year’s conviction on obstruction of justice charges. He hasn’t had a job in baseball since he was forced out of the game.
Pedro Gomez and Steroids, Round Two
From Chip Buck @ Fire Brand of the A.L.:
In case you were wondering, the debate over performance enhancing drugs, the Hall of Fame, and the steroid era’s place in history is still very much alive.
While on Twitter (where else?) on Tuesday afternoon, I came upon a seemingly innocuous tweet from ESPN‘s Pedro Gomez. Someone asked Gomez if he would consider voting home run king Barry Bonds into the Hall of Fame.
Given Gomez’s expertise with regards to Bonds, I was rather curious to how he’d respond. Not surprisingly, Gomez shared that he wouldn’t vote for any steroid users. While I disagreed with his opinion, I had no problem with it.
Provided he applied this axiom consistently across the board, I felt it was a perfectly valid opinion. To clear up any questions in my mind, I asked what he meant by “users.” Here’s the dialogue that ensued.
Pedro Gomez – Won’t vote for any “users” “
@Hunt1Brian:@pedrogomezESPN One more question, I know U followed Bonds career closely, would you vote him HOF.”Me - Are we talking suspected users or those we have proof used steroids (i.e. a very small number of people)
Pedro Gomez - Proof for several of them. Otherwise, I’ll trust my eyes.
Me - So Im assuming you can tell which people are gay completely based on appearance as well. Interesting.
Me - You can’t spot a steroid user with 100% certainty anymore than u can spot a date rapist, pedophile, or serial killer.
Pedro Gomez - Really, that’s your comeback?
Me - I think its a valid comparison. Not saying certain guys didnt use, but Im not going to make circumstantial assumptions.
Me - Did anyone think Ryan Franklin or Manny Alexander did steroids? No, but they were nailed with it.
Pedro Gomez - Done with you.
I am Jack’s total lack of surprise. Pedro Gomez, a member of the mainstream media, gets asked pointed, rational questions about his flawed methodology in determining the steroid users from the non-users; gets angry; mocks the one questioning him; and decides to take his ball and go home. Classy.
Ever noticed how Pedro Gomez hasn’t denied that he is a two-bit hack who is completely unworthy of the job that he has? #Ijusttrustmyeyes
11 Baseball Legends Who Were Legendary Assholes
"Raise your hand if you're a dick..."
By: Chris Morgan
Baseball is as synonymous with America as mom, apple pie, and morbid obesity, which probably goes hand in hand with the apple pie. We’ve all heard the names Ruth, DiMaggio, Aaron, these are the legends of the game who inspire us with awe and wonder.
However, with any group there’s sure to be a certain number of assholes, and baseball is no different. Maybe a little worse, in fact.
If, for even a moment, you held on to a shred of possibility it wasn’t all about the money, that was blown out of the water when he decided to write a second book which “had stuff” on the likes of A-Rod and Junior Griffey, two players who have never shown up in any steroids investigation. This means one of two things: Canseco was making shit up because he’s a dick, or he willingly held out the most surprising allegations from his first book in favor of turning his best friends in first, which makes him an even bigger dick.
Both of his wives have cited him for domestic violence, and both later divorced him. His second marriage was the classic American love story; boy meets girl working at Hooters, boy marries girl, boy hits girl, boy is arrested and put on probation, girl divorces boy, girl poses in Playboy using his last name. If those kids couldn’t make it work, what chance do the rest of us have?
There’s more to the story, like when he tried to blackmail Magglio Ordonez into giving him money to keep his name out of his second book. We emailed Bob Woodward to see if he ever tried blackmailing Gerald Ford, but he didn’t get back to us. The Canseco saga does have a happy ending though. Jose recently lost a “celebrity” boxing match to former NFL player Vai Sikahema in which Canseco was knocked out in the first round. Now if there was only some way we could make that happen seven or eight hundred more times we’d be good.
Cheap. Ass. Bastid.
#10 – Charles Comiskey:
Comiskey is best known for being the former owner of the Chicago White Sox, and for their field which was named after him, before it was changed to U.S. Cellular Field in honor of Ulysses Stanton Cellular.
However, back in the day, he was best known for being a miserably cheap bastard. It stands to reason that if you own a professional sports team, you have a shitload of money, and if you spend that money to buy a sports team, something that is utterly frivolous, it stands to reason that to cheap out on running that team makes you quite the douchebag. It’s just logic.
Charlie Comiskey was one such douchebag, paying his players substandard wages in a time before free agency, when they had no choice but to accept them. He promised one of his pitchers a $10,000 dollar bonus if he won thirty games in a season, but benched him right before he could reach that mark, preferring to save the money at the risk of losing some games. Also he wouldn’t pay for his player’s laundry. To reiterate, he bought a professional sports team, built them a stadium, then decided he’d rather they look like hobos than pay for laundry.
Of course, his stinginess ended up leading to the Black Sox Scandal, in which his team threw the World Series for cash. Cash, that one can presume went toward not smelling like shit.
