Last Updated: March 20th, 2024 by Michael Schatz
Baseball fans, probably more than any other fans, love to debate. They’ve been going back and forth for decades. Would Babe Ruth be able to handle today’s pitchers? Would Sandy Koufax have as much success against today’s hitters? Do analytics matter? Is the shift good or bad for the sport? The list goes on and on and on.
But perhaps one of – if not the – most hotly debated topics is whether Barry Bonds should be enshrined in the Hall of Fame.
I can already feel some of your blood boiling at just the mention of this.
One thing that shouldn’t be debated is that Bonds was an extremely talented player. Even before he became the most feared power hitter in the sport – and before the rumors of steroids were hanging over him like a dark cloud – he was a star. The man won two MVP awards while playing for the Pittsburgh Pirates – and this was well before the steroid scandal.
Bonds himself believes there shouldn’t even be a debate, saying in part, “I was in Federal court and I won my case. One hundred percent. Where is the vindication of me in my own sport? That’s what bothers me.”
As fans, we can debate the merits of Bonds’ argument all day long. But we’ve never stepped foot in the batter’s box or had to grind through a 10-day road trip. We can only go off what we see on TV. But someone who has been there and whose words carry weight is Hall of Fame catcher Johnny Bench.
As a guest on The Dan Patrick Show, Bench surprised a lot of fans with his take on Bonds’ claim of vindication, saying, “It should bother him.”
And he has a point. Major League Baseball didn’t test for steroids in those days. Bench calls it the “blender era”, a time when team trainers would create steroid cocktails to help players get stronger quicker. Heck, Bench even talks about being able to walk into a GNC in those days and buy products that today would be illegal in sports.
Bench gets even more candid later in the interview, “I’d have loved to have stuff. I mean you catch 154 days in a row like I did through one stretch, you would have loved to have something that would revitalize you and get you to the next level.”
This is a two-time World Series champion, two-time NL MVP, and a fourteen-time All-Star saying this. Maybe he has a point. It was a different time. Testing was nonexistent. And it wasn’t like only one guy was using. A lot of guys were.
But despite Bench’s comments, Bonds remains on the outside looking in. Will he ever be enshrined alongside Bench and the other greats of baseball? Well, that debate isn’t stopping anytime soon.