Did Bonds Ruin baseball

[redseat]

I mean, I know it is not fair to put all the blame on Bonds... But I do think if bonds never took, we would have a very different perspective of the steroid era...

Would we have baseball if it wasn't for Bonds?

 

[MilkSpiller22]

Would we have baseball if it wasn't for Bonds?

right now you mean??

 

[redseat]

right now you mean??

Well when baseball was "suffering" and would baseball be the way it is without Bonds? Would it have been worse?

 

[MilkSpiller22]

Well when baseball was "suffering" and would baseball be the way it is without Bonds? Would it have been worse?

again, I think bonds was the reason for the witch hunt... so yes, I think it would be better... simply because the cheating scandal would have been less public... and less fans would have been lost...


I don't think fans were lost because of steroids, I think fans were lost because the media wouldn't shut up about a cheating scandal with steroids... And all the reports that came from that... But it was the hatred of bonds that pushed this... If he wasn't breaking Hank Aaron's record, or whatever...

sure steroids would still be seen as cheating today.... and of course Bonds was not the only one to use.... But I do believe it would have been handled better by MLB and the media, if it wasn't for bonds...

 

[PEOPLESCHICKEN]

Strawberry and all were amazing to watch even as a Red Sox fan

Straw, Goooden, Hernandez, Dykstra

Like a bunch of rock stars

 

[Mofo]

the year before he hit 50, he only hit 16. the year after he hit 50, he only hit 18. Brady Anderson's 50 HR season has to be one of the biggest anomalies in the history of north american sports

LOL

He and his goofy sideburns deserve eternal doubt.

 

[msgkings322]

so, I watched the 30 for 30 last night about Sosa and McGwire...

And it made me think, about why baseball is a dying sport...


I came to the conclusion, that we all applauded the steroid era until Bonds... and once we looked down on the steroid era, then baseball was dead...

The steroid era evolved baseball into the Home-run strike out game, it also showed how cheating in baseball was rampant...

so, would we have cared as much if Bonds didn't do it??

Conclusion- Bonds Broke baseball...

Since a shit-ton of people did not just Bonds, wouldn't the same thing have happened if he didn't and everyone else still did?

Maybe steroids killed the game, maybe not. But it wasn't one guy.

 

[msgkings322]

Bonds was merely an exclamation point on a rampant period of cheating. Before Bonds, Sosa and McGwire were in a who-can-be-a-bigger-cheater contest. People were found out after Bonds too- Ryan Braun and the biggest cheater of all, Alex Rodriguez. And then there are the vast numbers of players who went undetected, such as almost the whole of the Baltimore Orioles and Oakland A's.

Bonds is only interesting because he was a great player before he swelled up like a balloon in a sadly obvious attempt to set a record.

Bonds was classic hubris. He saw lesser players like McGwire and Sosa get all the love, and he said hold my beer. He didn't start roiding until after 1998.

Why is A-Rod the biggest cheater of all?

 

[msgkings322]

Baseball not evolving ruined baseball

And shitty owners and a greedy players union.

It isn't really any one thing that 'ruined' baseball. And it's not 'ruined'. It's been around for 150 years, 120 in recognizable form. It peaked in the 1950s and then started slowly declining as history happened and the country evolved. NFL and then the NBA started rising. It's always going to be there, but it will fade and be a niche sport like boxing. Probably a bigger niche than that but smaller than now.

 

[msgkings322]

Again, the sosa vs McGwire was applauded... Steroids were not seen to be bad until Bonds was on his way to breaking the record 3 years later... and then Bonds had 4 of the best seasons of all time in his late 30s... he was reason the witch hunt even started...

So if Bonds stayed clean we never would have heard about the steroid era? GMAFB

 

[msgkings322]

but Sosa/McGwire saved baseball from the original strike... Bonds was the villain that created the need to END the steroid era... and it was the witch hunt that Killed baseball... Without bonds, I don't think there would have been a witch hunt...

That's idiotic

 

[Mofo]

Bonds was classic hubris. He saw lesser players like McGwire and Sosa get all the love, and he said hold my beer. He didn't start roiding until after 1998.

Oh, I believe it. There's simply nothing endearing about Barry Bonds or the way he cheated. The way he did it, why he did it, how he treated everyone around him, and that he did it to try to snag such an important record.

Why is A-Rod the biggest cheater of all?

Took steroid usage to a near art form in his deception. Lied about it, threw other players under the bus, etc.


The guy tipped pitches to players on the other team so that he could get similar info and inflate his HR totals. He once even screamed in a 3rd baseman's ear so that he'd drop a pop fly as he ran past.

 

[msgkings322]

Oh, I believe it. There's simply nothing endearing about Barry Bonds or the way he cheated. The way he did it, why he did it, how he treated everyone around him, and that he did it to try to snag such an important record.

Took steroid usage to a near art form in his deception. Lied about it, threw other players under the bus, etc.


The guy tipped pitches to players on the other team so that he could get similar info and inflate his HR totals. He once even screamed in a 3rd baseman's ear so that he'd drop a pop fly as he ran past.

I knew about the 3rd baseman thing. Not really the other stuff.

 

[Mofo]

I knew about the 3rd baseman thing. Not really the other stuff.

Really, you didn't know about the steroids? He got one of the longest suspensions in history for it- 211 games, knocked down to 162.

 

[msgkings322]

It was still too new when McGwire and Sosa were in their slugfest competition. Most people couldn't even pronounce the name of what McGwire was using (androstenedione), and there was no shortage of apologists at the time, who were pointing out that the substances weren't even outlawed. MLB had simply the worst PED policy of any major sport- lack of rules, lack of enforcement, thousands of loopholes. It was just something no one wanted to talk about, because HRs were fun and the sport needed fans to return.

Think so? I think a lot of casual fans got excited by the whole thing. Sure, anyone who wasn't new to baseball and lived outside of SF knew that the guy was cheating at the time. A large portion of the disdain was that Bonds was breaking Hank Aaron's career record, and Aaron was widely viewed to have been a much nicer guy than Bonds.

MLB's biggest problem, across its lifetime, is a perceived need to tinker with itself. For every decent improvement, such as night games, there's a dozen stupid bonehead changes, like wearing shorts, video review or juicing the ball.

All the sports tinker. Gotta improve the product. Not to say every change is an improvement.

 

[msgkings322]

Really, you didn't know about the steroids? He got one of the longest suspensions in history for it- 211 games, knocked down to 162.

I knew he did roids of course, didn't know about the pitch tipping or that he was more of a jerk about the roids than others were (Clemens, Palmeiro, Bonds, etc)

 

[MilkSpiller22]

Since a shit-ton of people did not just Bonds, wouldn't the same thing have happened if he didn't and everyone else still did?

Maybe steroids killed the game, maybe not. But it wasn't one guy.

So if Bonds stayed clean we never would have heard about the steroid era? GMAFB

That's idiotic

Let me try to make my point more clear...

After 1998 when Sosa and McGwire had that HR race, baseball was at its highest... Steroids SAVED the game, it did not destroy it... It was the cheating scandals and the witch hunts that broke baseball... The urgency to end the steroid era, was all because of Bonds's success... The media hated him, and vilified him... fans followed because the casual fans are lemmings and will comment about things they hear... Hell, there is steroids in football still, and nobody ever talks about it...


again, the witch hunts happened because the media cried so much about bonds breaking the Season HR record 3 years later and then breaking Aaron's Career HR record..

If it wasn't for Bonds, sure the steroid era would still be over, and would still have a stigma of cheating... But it would have been handled better, as there would have been no URGENCY... it probably would have just been swept under the rug... We would all know about it but the taste would just not be what it is now....

 

[msgkings322]

Let me try to make my point more clear...

After 1998 when Sosa and McGwire had that HR race, baseball was at its highest... Steroids SAVED the game, it did not destroy it... It was the cheating scandals and the witch hunts that broke baseball... The urgency to end the steroid era, was all because of Bonds's success... The media hated him, and vilified him... fans followed because the casual fans are lemmings and will comment about things they hear... Hell, there is steroids in football still, and nobody ever talks about it...


again, the witch hunts happened because the media cried so much about bonds breaking the Season HR record 3 years later and then breaking Aaron's Career HR record..

If it wasn't for Bonds, sure the steroid era would still be over, and would still have a stigma of cheating... But it would have been handled better, as there would have been no URGENCY... it probably would have just been swept under the rug... We would all know about it but the taste would just not be what it is now....

I don't agree with any of this, including the claim that 1998 was baseball's peak. Baseball peaked in terms of national focus and popularity in the 1950s. By 1998 the NFL had already passed it and the NBA had just made a huge leap with Michael Jordan's last championship

 

[MilkSpiller22]

I don't agree with any of this, including the claim that 1998 was baseball's peak. Baseball peaked in terms of national focus and popularity in the 1950s. By 1998 the NFL had already passed it and the NBA had just made a huge leap with Michael Jordan's last championship

didnt mean 1998 was the peak, i just meant after 1998 baseball was back... the HR race was just as big as any Sporting news ever...

 

[msgkings322]

didnt mean 1998 was the peak, i just meant after 1998 baseball was back... the HR race was just as big as any Sporting news ever...

Agreed, the roid fest did bring back some interest after the strike.

But believe me, even if it wasn't Bonds, eventually the steroid monster would have come out of the closet. And it's not steroids or even HR/K/BB focus "ruining" baseball. It's not ruined. It's just fading. It's a 20th century sport in the 21st century. It's just not conducive to the modern sports fan