Off Topic: Two Cents on Barry Bonds
I'm sure anyone and everyone is sick of reading/hearing about Bonds. I am. I'm so sick of it that I feel compelled to post about Bonds so I never have to think of him again. Given that, I do not blame anyone for choosing to stop reading here and moving on. If you choose to keep reading, however, welcome to the little window in to my mind.
I see both sides of the argument regarding the saga of steroids and sports, culminating in Bonds' indictment.
On the one hand, I think it is 99.9% certain that Barry Bonds committed a crime, and you can count me as a supporter of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in deciding to prosecute Bonds for his crime. On the other hand, the media downplays the fact that Bonds’ crime was not for taking steroids. Rather, his crime was overtly, knowingly, purposefully, and repeatedly lying to federal investigators about taking steroids. By downplaying this in favor of whiny overtures on ethics or empty outbursts against a oerceived widespread use of performance enhancing drugs, the national media has only served to throw unnecessary fire on a tiresome, shallow, self-righteous, and seemingly never ending debate on the effects of steroids on destroying our national innocence. That’s irresponsible reporting, and does nothing to focus on the million or so other more menacing problems that plague modern society.
The media's crime here (as it usually is) is to favor knee-jerk reporting and tabloid-esque shallow debates in favor of actually evaluating the legal situation. O.J. Simpson anyone? The media has largely ignored that in the eyes of lawmakers and law enforcers, there is a HUGE difference between violating the law and lying to the law about violating the law. Indicting Bonds for perjury and obstruction of justice is less some sort of symbolically epic indictment of the steroids era (as the media would like to portray) but instead has everything to do with the fact that Bonds chose to cover his ass instead of assisting a federal grand jury in its obligation to evaluate evidence and fact in pursuing a rogue California laboratory that was illegally manufacturing and distributing a Type III controlled substance.
In the end, Barry Bonds has no one to blame but himself for his sticky legal situation. When the time came for him to face the music, he could think of no one but himself, and chose to lie to a federal grand jury because of it. His choice was selfish, vain and imcomprehensibly illogical. End of story. Why illogical you ask? From a legal perspective, the media has further downplayed the fact that Bonds had received legal immunity from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in exchange for his grand jury testimony. Having worked at a criminal defense firm for a year, I can tell you that this getting immunity is the equivalent of a carte-blanche get out of jail free card. The Department of Justice does not take it lightly and a prosecutor requesting immunity in most cases has to receive a green light from Washington prior to granting it. To make a long story short, Bonds could have simply admitted the truth in his testimony - "I took steroids and other PED's, manufactured by BALCO, to boost my career and pursue a home run record" - and gone on with his life, entirely free from federal prosecution. Of course, this would have come at the expense of national ridicule, likely disciplinary action from Major League Baseball, and perhaps his pursuit of the home run record, but in hindsight, the alternative has been much worse.
We often joke about Jason Grimsley and Jason Giambi’s drug-fueled careers, but the fact is that when the music came to them, they didn’t dance around it like Bonds did. They cooperated with law enforcers. Giambi went so far as to cooperate with lawmakers. They disclosed names of users and distributors. They admitted, albeit half-heartedly and under pressure, that they took illegal drugs to support their careers. Because of this choice, they have faded into either relative obscurity (Giambi) or the realm of scorn (Grimsley) in the minds of baseball fans. But we forget that they had a choice when the lawmen came a knockin' at their doors and in retrospect it is clear that they made the right decision for themselves to come clean. Giambi is still playing with the Yankees and making his millions. Grimsley is retired, living in wealth, and largely an afterthought. Most importantly for them, because of their choice they do not have to face the fury of a federal criminal action for their choices in the past. Barry Bonds chose to lie, and however unfairly or fairly we believe he has been treated over the past four years, the fact is that at the time he possessed the dual power of having an immunity agreement AND a choice as to whether to be truthful. For the U.S. Attorney's Office, prosecuting Bonds for the choice he made is a logical legal action. In the eyes of he law, steroids pose a problem because they are dangerous, and because they are dangerous they are therefore illegal. Lying to federal prosecutors, moreover, is illegal because it impedes the supposedly objective enforcement of the law. That is what Bonds is charged with, and that is the choice that brought him to this point.
Unfortunately, the media does not deal with U.S. v. Bonds as it should, choosing instead to focus on fiction of U.S. v. Bonds, Steroids, and Some Sort of Imaginary Assault on the Children and the Innocence of Sport. Please, spare me. First, sport is not some sort of pure institution being assaulted by a comic book supervillian. It's a flawed venue comprised of human beings, who, like you and I, make mistakes because we spend most of our time being either stupid, vain and/or uninformed. C'est la vie. Get used to it. Barry Bonds is not an evil figure. He's rather a weak and overly defensive person who was blessed with an impeccable talent to hit a baseball a long ways. He's rather an unintelligent person who failed to realize that even if he did not supplement his talent with steroids he would still be one of the best baseball players of all time. He fell victim to his egotistical desires. Any of these three characterizations works, but he's not the villain the media makes him out to be.
Do you see what I'm getting at? The media has to take the blame for the tiresome and overplayed debacle that the steroids issue has become. More importantly, prosecuting Bonds is in no way a cleansing of our national conscience or a cathartic means with which to lament the effect of steroids on sports (as Gammons so crudely argued - "I feel sad"). The use of steroids is not a top-10 problem facing our society, perhaps, at least to my mind, not even a top-1000 problem. The use of steroids, and more importantly the individual decision to use steroids and the collective nation’s choice to downplay/ignore the ethical and legal debates surrounding steroids in favor of entertaining displays of worldly success, are simply indicative of the larger issue of human weakness when it comes to the fleeting prospect of physical advantage and/or psychological glory over our fellow men. Success is a worthy pursuit but always comes with a price to a varying degree. For Barry Bonds, that price may be his freedom and his legacy. Does he realize that? Even now, I highly doubt it. If one thing has been true throughout the steroids era, it is that Barry Bonds and the national media have been too weak, too subconscious, or perhaps too scared to admit to the reality of the human face behind the masks of the talking heads.
I see both sides of the argument regarding the saga of steroids and sports, culminating in Bonds' indictment.
On the one hand, I think it is 99.9% certain that Barry Bonds committed a crime, and you can count me as a supporter of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in deciding to prosecute Bonds for his crime. On the other hand, the media downplays the fact that Bonds’ crime was not for taking steroids. Rather, his crime was overtly, knowingly, purposefully, and repeatedly lying to federal investigators about taking steroids. By downplaying this in favor of whiny overtures on ethics or empty outbursts against a oerceived widespread use of performance enhancing drugs, the national media has only served to throw unnecessary fire on a tiresome, shallow, self-righteous, and seemingly never ending debate on the effects of steroids on destroying our national innocence. That’s irresponsible reporting, and does nothing to focus on the million or so other more menacing problems that plague modern society.
The media's crime here (as it usually is) is to favor knee-jerk reporting and tabloid-esque shallow debates in favor of actually evaluating the legal situation. O.J. Simpson anyone? The media has largely ignored that in the eyes of lawmakers and law enforcers, there is a HUGE difference between violating the law and lying to the law about violating the law. Indicting Bonds for perjury and obstruction of justice is less some sort of symbolically epic indictment of the steroids era (as the media would like to portray) but instead has everything to do with the fact that Bonds chose to cover his ass instead of assisting a federal grand jury in its obligation to evaluate evidence and fact in pursuing a rogue California laboratory that was illegally manufacturing and distributing a Type III controlled substance.
In the end, Barry Bonds has no one to blame but himself for his sticky legal situation. When the time came for him to face the music, he could think of no one but himself, and chose to lie to a federal grand jury because of it. His choice was selfish, vain and imcomprehensibly illogical. End of story. Why illogical you ask? From a legal perspective, the media has further downplayed the fact that Bonds had received legal immunity from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in exchange for his grand jury testimony. Having worked at a criminal defense firm for a year, I can tell you that this getting immunity is the equivalent of a carte-blanche get out of jail free card. The Department of Justice does not take it lightly and a prosecutor requesting immunity in most cases has to receive a green light from Washington prior to granting it. To make a long story short, Bonds could have simply admitted the truth in his testimony - "I took steroids and other PED's, manufactured by BALCO, to boost my career and pursue a home run record" - and gone on with his life, entirely free from federal prosecution. Of course, this would have come at the expense of national ridicule, likely disciplinary action from Major League Baseball, and perhaps his pursuit of the home run record, but in hindsight, the alternative has been much worse.
We often joke about Jason Grimsley and Jason Giambi’s drug-fueled careers, but the fact is that when the music came to them, they didn’t dance around it like Bonds did. They cooperated with law enforcers. Giambi went so far as to cooperate with lawmakers. They disclosed names of users and distributors. They admitted, albeit half-heartedly and under pressure, that they took illegal drugs to support their careers. Because of this choice, they have faded into either relative obscurity (Giambi) or the realm of scorn (Grimsley) in the minds of baseball fans. But we forget that they had a choice when the lawmen came a knockin' at their doors and in retrospect it is clear that they made the right decision for themselves to come clean. Giambi is still playing with the Yankees and making his millions. Grimsley is retired, living in wealth, and largely an afterthought. Most importantly for them, because of their choice they do not have to face the fury of a federal criminal action for their choices in the past. Barry Bonds chose to lie, and however unfairly or fairly we believe he has been treated over the past four years, the fact is that at the time he possessed the dual power of having an immunity agreement AND a choice as to whether to be truthful. For the U.S. Attorney's Office, prosecuting Bonds for the choice he made is a logical legal action. In the eyes of he law, steroids pose a problem because they are dangerous, and because they are dangerous they are therefore illegal. Lying to federal prosecutors, moreover, is illegal because it impedes the supposedly objective enforcement of the law. That is what Bonds is charged with, and that is the choice that brought him to this point.
Unfortunately, the media does not deal with U.S. v. Bonds as it should, choosing instead to focus on fiction of U.S. v. Bonds, Steroids, and Some Sort of Imaginary Assault on the Children and the Innocence of Sport. Please, spare me. First, sport is not some sort of pure institution being assaulted by a comic book supervillian. It's a flawed venue comprised of human beings, who, like you and I, make mistakes because we spend most of our time being either stupid, vain and/or uninformed. C'est la vie. Get used to it. Barry Bonds is not an evil figure. He's rather a weak and overly defensive person who was blessed with an impeccable talent to hit a baseball a long ways. He's rather an unintelligent person who failed to realize that even if he did not supplement his talent with steroids he would still be one of the best baseball players of all time. He fell victim to his egotistical desires. Any of these three characterizations works, but he's not the villain the media makes him out to be.
Do you see what I'm getting at? The media has to take the blame for the tiresome and overplayed debacle that the steroids issue has become. More importantly, prosecuting Bonds is in no way a cleansing of our national conscience or a cathartic means with which to lament the effect of steroids on sports (as Gammons so crudely argued - "I feel sad"). The use of steroids is not a top-10 problem facing our society, perhaps, at least to my mind, not even a top-1000 problem. The use of steroids, and more importantly the individual decision to use steroids and the collective nation’s choice to downplay/ignore the ethical and legal debates surrounding steroids in favor of entertaining displays of worldly success, are simply indicative of the larger issue of human weakness when it comes to the fleeting prospect of physical advantage and/or psychological glory over our fellow men. Success is a worthy pursuit but always comes with a price to a varying degree. For Barry Bonds, that price may be his freedom and his legacy. Does he realize that? Even now, I highly doubt it. If one thing has been true throughout the steroids era, it is that Barry Bonds and the national media have been too weak, too subconscious, or perhaps too scared to admit to the reality of the human face behind the masks of the talking heads.
posted by Gen at
3:47 PM
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