Schilling Slams Bonds
Two-time World Series Winner Blasts Record Chasing Hitter
In a year when the dollar is getting killed by several currencies in world markets, the worth of bonds is now in question too (in baseball), courtesy of a man who shares his name with an obsolete currency.
It's San Francisco Giants star Barry Bonds who's again the target of controversy. The outfielder's new antagonist: Boston Red Sox Pitcher Curt Schilling.
Schilling, speaking to WEEI-AM Tuesday morning, contends that Bonds cheats at the game the two men play for a living. The remarks come a year after Schilling suggested that those who use performance-enhancing substances in Major League Baseball should have their records achieved during a suspected drug-using timeframe erased.
“He admitted that he used steroids, there’s no gray area,” according to Schilling on WEEI's morning show. “He admitted to cheating on his wife, he admitted to cheating on his taxes and he cheated on the game."
At the moment, Bonds is the man most likely to eclipse baseball legend Hank Aaron in the homerun department. Bonds currently has 745 lifetime, needs 10 to tie Hammerin' Hank, and 11 to surmount him. Add to that the minimal penalties assessed for Bonds' alleged steroid use in recent years, and his chances of breaking the record have scarcely been affected, if at all.
Nevertheless, neither Aaron, nor Babe Ruth, nor Mickey Mantle were ever suspected of using steroids.
"I think the reaction around the league, around the game, seeing what it is, is an indication of what people think," Schilling adds. "Hank Aaron not being there, the commissioner trying to figure out where to be...it’s sad.”
Schilling may pitch to Bonds when the Giants visit Fenway Park in Boston next month. He doesn't foresee a beanball war, yet also does not intend to give up Bonds' 756th homer, if those are the circumstances come mid-June.
"Not on purpose, hell no!" Schilling says about giving Bonds good pitches to hit. "I don’t want to be Al Downing." Downing was the Los Angeles Dodger pitcher who surrendered Hank Aaron's then record-breaking 715th homer on April 8, 1974 in Atlanta.
Bonds may get jeered in Boston whether Schilling's pitching or not. In 2004, Bonds claimed that the city was "too racist" for him. He told Gordon Edes of the Boston Globe that year that albeit there was rumor-mill talk of Bonds finishing his career as a designated hitter in the American League, that he would never play in Beantown.
"I couldn't play there," Bonds said. "I'm black, they don't build stuff for blacks," he adds, referring to the tunnel built in Boston for white legend Ted Williams.
Bonds has never played a game in Fenway Park, in his two decades in the majors. The closest he came was the 1999 All Star game, which he missed due to injury.
Journalists have even suggested that perhaps the climate Bonds was alluding to may have changed here in the 21st century. He played that down too.
"It aint changing," Bonds said. "It aint changing anywhere."
Maybe not, in light of broadcasting veteran Don Imus' recent "nappy-headed ho" reference to the Rutgers women's basketball team. It ignited blazes of controversy and sabotaged Imus' TV and radio careers.
Yet others say sports is sports, and the playing field should be level for all who compete.
“I don’t care that he’s black or green or purple or yellow or whatever - it’s unfortunate,” Schilling goes on to say about Bonds. “There are good people and bad people. It’s unfortunate it’s happening the way it happened.”
The Giants and Red Sox meet for three games, June 15-17th in Boston.
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