In all of sports there have been few villains as despised as Barry Bonds. Living in the Los Angeles area there is a certain distain for all things Bonds that is embedded at birth for those of us within driving distance of Dodgers stadium. Here’s the thing,I don’t really dislike the guy,in fact,I kinda love me some Barry. Villains are always cooler than heros and always seem to have better powers. Darth Vader was cooler than Luke,the Joker would be way more fun to party with than Batman and at the end of the day Barry Bonds with or without steroids was cooler and better than 99% of the rest of the league. Without further ado,here are five reasons I still love Barry.
1.)Barry Bonds used to look like the kid next door. We all know the raging hulk version of Bonds via the 90’s but few seem to remember the skinny kid with a big smile and an even bigger stache. I know, facial hair was covered last week in depth and I don’t want to spend to much time dwelling on it but look at this pic and tell me the Stache doesn’t make you want you to pick up a needle and chill with barry.
2.)Barry made a better than Paula Abdul than even Paula. It takes a real man to throw on some drag for the enjoyment of his team,it takes an even bigger man to dominate it like Bonds did for the Giants “American Idol” day. The picture says enough!
3.)Barry was fun to boo. I have personally attended several Dodger games and had the priviledge to boo Mr.Bonds with all that I have. Funny thing,he seemed to love it! He would bow before running off the field, give it right back to overweight Dodger fans who were running there mouths and probably my favorite,more than once he pretended to throw a ball to the stands.
4.)Barry made asterisks cool. The asterisk may never be as cool as the ampersand but at the end of the day all baseball fans will always think Bonds when they see “*”. Name another athlete who has meant so much to a forgotten character than Barry Bonds. Rollie Fingers had the mustache,Ozzie Smith had the back flip and Barry Bonds will always own the asterisk.*
5.)Even steroid home runs are home runs. There is nothing in all of sports as cool as the home run. Break away touchdowns are cool,slam dunks are always fun but home runs are in a league of there own. Even when your team is getting killed a home run brings the fans to there feet and even with all the drama, Barry did this for Pirates and Giants fans 756* (<--see what I did there?) times.
Love him or hate him Barry did it his way and no one will ever forget it.*