Is there any other kind these days? No sooner has Sports Illustrated posted an excerpt from a book that has damming evidence (like we needed it) that Barry Bonds was on the juice than the slugger came out and denied it. Just wait for the tests, he says. As if tests that can so easily be beaten by professional cheaters like Bonds mean anything.

Personally I didn't need proof that Bonds was using steroids. I saw it with my own eyes. The whole time this was going down in the late 90s, I was living in Burlingame where Bonds was working out in with trainer and drug pusher Greg Anderson. I once saw him during lunch at Le Boulangerie in San Carlos. The guy was massive. This was not the skinny kid that I had seen playing centerfield for Arizona State way back when. You can't get that big without some kind of chemical assistance. No way.

But there is (allegedly) proof not only that Bonds did steroids but that he perjured himself in front of the grand jury during the Balco investigation. It's sad. It really is. Bonds is one of the greatest players in the game. He didn't need to use steroids. He was on his way to the Hall of Fame. But he supersized ego couldn't or wouldn't let him play clean. He needed HGH and the cream and clear and god knows what other stimulants to recover quicker, get jacked up for games and launch home runs at a rate faster than anyone else in the history of the game to feel good about himself.

I was listening on the radio this morning to two San Francisco apologists, comedian Will Durst and Mayor Willie Brown. Both acted as if this was no big deal. The Mayor said that Bonds is not a role model, that professional athletes are not role models and shouldn't be? Was he serious? No matter how great you are as parent, kids are going to develop heroes on their own. The media presents overpaid, juiced athletes as heroes and then politicos like Brown say they aren't. There's a disconnect there. Then Durst started talking about how it wasn't fair to Bonds because all the players in the league are juiced up. The everybody's doing it so no one's at fault rule. He pointed to the pitchers that Bonds faces. He pointed to Marvin Benard. Marvin Benard? Marvin Benard is a lifetime .270 hitter with fewer career home runs (54) than Bonds hit in the 2001 season. No one is interested in Marvin Benard.

Unlike Bonds, Marvin Benard has never perjured himself in front of Grand Jury. Never. Not once. Barry Bonds, if the allegations are true, is a felon. What is baseball going to do about it? We'll see. They are usually slow to act in these matters. Personally I think there needs to be a massive investigation. I know the Giants knew what was going on. But they did nothing. Why? Because Bonds was carrying water for a shitty team that needed to draw fans to its new downtown ballpark. They got some truly great years out of Bonds. The stands were packed. They made it to the World Series. They got everything they wanted but a championship.

And then there's Bonds. Perpetually angry. For what? For growing up the privileged son of a major league player? For having all the god given talent anyone could ever want? For nothing really. The guy's got a life most people on the planet would sell their soul for. But Bonds in angry. He's spiteful. He's bitter. He should be a great ambassador and, yes, Mayor Brown, a role model, but instead he's a juiced-up, ass hole who's about the become the center of a media shit storm that's going to ruin his world.

Then we'll see how long he lives. We all know that steroids take a massive toll on the body. Five years from now when Bonds has massive renal failure and is on a kidney transplant list, is anyone going to shed a tear for him? No. It will just be the final sentence in the indictment that his pathetic life.