Free Republic

LEAVE IT TO the good people of Philadelphia, whose football fans once famously booed and threw snowballs at Santa Claus, to come up with the perfect takedown of the most inflated (in more ways than one) superstar in contemporary sport. With the visiting Barry Bonds at the plate and needing just two home runs to tie Babe Ruth’s iconic 714 lifetime homers, the banner was raised: “Ruth did it on hot dogs & beer.” The target of this concise discourse on the roots of greatness has been booed lustily in every major league city he’s played in outside his hometown...

Barry Bonds was in Milwaukee recently and the commissioner of baseball wouldn’t make the 10-minute drive from his house to watch him. So it follows that Bud Selig wasn’t in when Bonds moved past Babe Ruth on the home run list. Nor were any of Ruth’s children. Nor any high-level officials. Nor anybody whose presence screamed, “I’m important, so I’m here.” Barry Bonds hit his 715th home run Sunday. But every overblown ESPN news break-in couldn’t drown out the sad reality of the moment. It was as awkward as it was historical. Some wanted to watch. Most wanted to cover...

Barry Bonds circles the bases these days to the sound of one hand clapping ... and one knee creaking. The Shambino is just a homer away from 714 -- Babe Ruth's address -- but the only people outside of McCovey Cove who seem to care are the ones at ESPN, his own private Paraguay. Barry's their boy. To the bitter end. And rarely has the pursuit of a record left such a sour taste. Indeed, Bonds' growing home run total elicits about the same response from the masses as that tote board in New York City, the one that keeps...

NEW YORK (AP) -- Barry Bonds will have to wait until he passes Hank Aaron before baseball throws a party for him. Major League Baseball is not planning any celebration for Bonds if and when he tops Babe Ruth's mark of 714 home runs, commissioner Bud Selig said Thursday. "Hank Aaron broke Babe Ruth's record," Selig said. "We don't celebrate anybody the second or third time in." Bonds has been the subject of steroids speculation for several seasons. The recent book "Game of Shadows" detailed allegations against him, and a federal grand jury is investigating whether he committed perjury when...

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Gary Sheffield knew full well he was doping, and Jason Giambi was turned on to a cocktail of performance-enhancing drugs similar to what Barry Bonds was taking, according to a new book. "Game of Shadows," set for release Thursday, says BALCO's performance-enhancing drugs were used by several athletes, including track stars Marion Jones and Tim Montgomery, NFL players such as Bill Romanowski, and sluggers including Bonds, Sheffield and Giambi. It centers on Bonds' allegedly extensive drug regimen - steroids, human growth hormone, insulin and more - but also undercuts Sheffield's claims that he took designer steroids...

Albert Pujols, the Lou Gehrig of our times, picked up his first Most Valuable Player Award the other day. But if baseball had begun testing for drugs when other sports did, it might well have been Pujols' third MVP -- in just five major league seasons. And then we'd be saying, rightly, "This guy might be the best player to come along in 50 years." Pujols had the misfortune of breaking in around the time Barry Bonds developed a taste for "flaxseed oil." Thus, he finished second to Bonds in the '02 and '03 National League voting instead of, perhaps,...