The Truth About Barry Bonds And Steroids

Despite it all, there still were moments when Bonds was attentive and kind, as he had been in the old days. One night during spring training in 2001, they went to dinner at Morton's, and afterward the Arizona sky was lit up with a spectacular desert sunset. "I would love to live here," Bell said, and Bonds replied, "Is that all you want?" Over the next few days he came up with a plan to buy her a house in Scottsdale, paying for it in installments with the cash from card shows. It was a move they both would come to regret.

If the pitch was three inches outside the strike zone, Bonds would ignore it and work another base on balls. But if the pitch was located where he could drive it--and in 2001 that seemed to be anywhere in the strike zone--he would take a rip. � If he hit the ball squarely, and that season it seemed he almost always did, Bonds would toss his black maple bat aside and saunter two or three steps down the first base line while he watched the ball sail out of sight. Only then would he begin the slow jog around the bases, often with a blank look on his face, occasionally with a slight smile.

If he hit a milestone home run, and that season he hit many of them, he might throw his arms up like a football official signaling a touchdown before he started his home run trot. Often when he crossed home plate, he pointed both hands skyward and raised his eyes, in what he described to interviewers as a tribute to God. If the home run was special enough, he might take a curtain call, coming out of the dugout and doffing his cap. There were many curtain calls that summer, as Bonds--systematically, methodically and with little suspense--obliterated baseball's single-season home run record, which had seemed so unassailable just three years before.

The fans turned out for Bonds, but there was a muted feel to baseball's reaction to his home run march, a sense of anticlimax. It simply wasn't as big a deal as it had been in 1998 when McGwire was breaking a 37-year-old record.

There were many possible explanations for the tepid response, beginning with Bonds's image. His reputation for surly self-absorption was proving hard to overcome. Although the press coverage was usually positive, he just wasn't popular with fans outside San Francisco. Perhaps, as Bonds himself would say, the reaction to his achievement was muted because he was a black man in a white man's game.

Bonds's appearance--and the way it had morphed over the years--also proved unsettling to some fans. Although McGwire had bulked up, he already was a big man when he hit 49 home runs as an A's rookie in 1987. Mac was still recognizable 11 years later on the Cardinals. But the massive, pumped-up Bonds of 2001 didn't look anything like the Giant of the late '90s, much less the lithe, young Pirate of the late '80s and early '90s who used to knock the ball into the gap, accelerate as he took the turn at first base and fly into second for a double.

Perhaps what gave the most pause about Bonds's march, however, was that it was occurring so soon after McGwire's. Baseball records were supposed to last, particularly ones as momentous as the single-season home run mark. Now something different and unsettling seemed to be going on.

On April 17 Bonds hit his 500th career home run. By June 1 he had 28. On June 22 the Giants traveled to St. Louis for a three-game series that underscored the changed fortunes of Bonds and McGwire. McGwire's body had begun breaking down. He would finish 2001 with a freak-show batting line: an average of .187 with 29 home runs. Of his 56 hits, more than half were home runs.

Bonds was now the focus of baseball's attention, trailed by a growing media entourage. He arrived in St. Louis with 38 home runs. In the second game of the series he hit number 39, a shot that bounced off a pillar underpinning the rightfield stands at Busch Stadium. As they had since the barrage had begun, the press pack wanted Bonds to discuss his incredible power. As usual he wouldn't be drawn out. He had come closest to offering an explanation after hitting six home runs in three games against the Braves in May.

"There are some things I don't understand right now," he said. "Call God. Ask him. It's like, wow. I can't understand it, either."