Bonds and Plaschke Get Juices Flowing

I couldn’t tell from your Sept. 18 photo of Barry Bonds hitting his 700th home run if he was watching the ball hit the bleachers or if SBC Park had installed a giant mirror for him to fawn all over himself.

Speaking of fawning, Bill Plaschke missed the ball entirely. Steroid use is illegal. Whether it propels a ball 400 feet or 20, it poisons the body and sport.

Jeanine D’Elia

Granada Hills

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I would like to root for Barry Bonds, but I can’t.

He is the consummate professional, he never brags, and his numbers are incredible. But the cloud of steroids sullies his accomplishments. His meteoric rise in home run production in 2001, as well as his increased bulk and head size, coincides with the timing of the allegations of steroid use in the BALCO investigation. Barry can deny it and hope that the smoking gun never emerges, but where there’s smoke there’s fire.

Kenneth Spencer

Pacific Palisades

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It is unseemly for Mr. Plaschke, a reporter, to turn himself into a giddy cheerleader for a man who may very well be cheating his way toward baseball’s most hallowed record. The column quotes “a leading steroid scientist” who thinks that a juiced player can hit a ball about 20 feet farther than he normally would. Let it be noted that Bonds’ milestone 700th homer made it over the left-field wall at SBC Park by about five feet.

Ed Lomax

Rancho Cucamonga

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Plaschke’s cited medical expert indicated that a “ball might travel 20 feet farther” if hit by a steroid-fueled batter. Thus, it is reasonable to assume that, if Bonds is on steroids, some of Bonds’ home runs would have stayed in the park otherwise. So any home run record Bonds sets is bogus. What if he ends up hitting 756 home runs? Is he now a “greater home run hitter” than Hank Aaron? Not to me he isn’t.

Mark Wallis

Thousand Oaks

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I hate to rain on Barry Bonds’ 700-homer parade, but the facts are undisputed. In the nine seasons before the strike in 1994, Bonds averaged 28 homers. Bonds has increased his average to 44 homers a year in the 10 post-strike seasons. The reasons undoubtedly include juiced-up balls, a juiced-up body and smaller ballparks. Sorry, Barry, I don’t believe you suddenly became the reincarnation of Babe Ruth after turning 40.

Mark S. Roth

Long Beach

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If it is conclusively proved that Bonds has used banned performance-enhancing substances -- and I strongly believe that he has -- Barry deserves the same punishment given Pete Rose: Bonds should be banned from baseball and barred from the Hall of Fame.

Dave Perkin

Redondo Beach