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(Cobb)Openly admitted to sharpening his cleats

Oh, give me a break! Thats not the same thing as pumping your body up with drugs so you end up looking like a freak , for starters. And by the way, Cobb's lifetime batting average was over 80 points higher than the league average, and he didnt do it by "sharpening his cleats".

Sheesh, youre gonna have to do better than that. Throughout history, even the great players went into severe decline when they hit 36,37. Oddly enough, thats when Bonds had his most fantastic years. What a coincidence!!

In some ways Cobb was the anti-Bonds (as a player I mean, he was truly an ass as a person), see story below (from Wiki but I have read this elsewhere and it is well referenced and supported with real stats):

As Ruth's popularity grew, Cobb became increasingly hostile toward him. Cobb saw Ruth not only as a threat to his style of play, but also to his style of life. While Cobb preached ascetic self-denial, Ruth gorged on hot dogs, beer, and women.[52][53][54] Perhaps what angered him the most about Ruth was that despite Ruth's total disregard for his physical condition and traditional baseball, he was still an overwhelming success and brought fans to the ballparks in record numbers to see him set his own records.

After enduring several years of seeing his fame and notoriety usurped by Ruth, Cobb decided that he was going to show that swinging for the fences was no challenge for a top hitter. On May 5, 1925, Cobb began a two-game hitting spree better than any even Ruth had unleashed. He was sitting in the dugout talking to a reporter and told him that, for the first time in his career, he was going to swing for the fences. That day, Cobb went 6 for 6, with two singles, a double, and three home runs.[55] His 16 total bases set a new AL record. The next day he had three more hits, two of which were home runs. His single his first time up gave him 9 consecutive hits over three games. His five homers in two games tied the record set by Cap Anson of the old Chicago NL team in 1884.[55] Cobb wanted to show that he could hit home runs when he wanted, but simply chose not to do so. At the end of the series, 38-year-old Cobb had gone 12 for 19 with 29 total bases, and then went happily back to bunting and hitting-and-running.