Barry Bonds - Steroid Cheater & Dumbass

Barry Bonds might have a lot of home runs on his record, but he could've used a little more common sense.

Having read the teaser excerpts from the new book, "Game of Shadows," at SI.com, we are eager to read the rest as soon as we can get our hands on one. If the teaser is truly illustrative of the book, drawn from insider interviews, federal grand jury documents, and other sources, Bonds' life - and Major League baseball - may be forever changed.

For the better.

Today comes news that Bonds' attorneys have gone to federal court not to block the book's release but to prevent its authors from making a profit because, they contend, it contains information obtained illegally, from docs that were supposed to be kept secret (and sealed).

Good luck, gentlemen. Leaking grand jury documents is routine business in this country, like it or not.

But what are the attorneys actually saying? They are confirming the material as accurate. They are not disputing the truth of the info, just the legality of its airing. It's possible, we suppose, that they are only doing Barry's bidding, but if this was their idea, he should fire them immediately.

Further, if Bud Selig ever needed one more factoid to review before deciding whether to initiate a full-scale probe of the San Francisco cheat, er, slugger, this was it. Mr. Commissioner, the Bonds Squad has given you all the ammunition you need to declare an investigation under way. If you had true moxie, you would suspend him from playing until the results of the investigation were known.

In the excerpts, Bonds comes across as petty, jealous and vindictive, which is pretty much what his friends and enemies have been saying about him for some time. Unhappy that merely being an excellent ballplayer wasn't getting him the kind of attention paid to Sammy Sosa and Mark McGuire, he allegedly decided to go for broke the modern way: he would blind the record books with science. Nevermind the dangers to his body, and the changes to his moods.

If you are in the slightest degree interested in the integrity of baseball or the Bonds story, read the excerpts for yourself. See if there isn't a ring of truth in there.

This is not to say that Bonds was alone in what was done. It's just to say that, if the allegations are true, he's done more damage to the integrity of the game than any other player.

And it's time to clean up the game.