The Bonds Meme
posted in 2008 season |Ever since the Tigers lineup stumbled out of the gate, a small trickle of a theme has turned into a full-blown meme: Detroit needs Barry Bonds. Rob Parker in the Detroit News is only the most recent writer to trumpet that claim. It’s even shown up on USA Today. A Google News search Detroit Tigers + Barry Bonds reveals 89 entries, though not all are an exact fit.
I’m here to tell you that’s crazy talk. And it doesn’t long to explain why.
- The Tigers’ offense is not the problem. It’s not like this is a team with incredible pitching but no run scoring. No. This is a team with an incredible, but so-far inconsistent offense that can’t win when it scores four runs because the pitching is so bad it can’t hold any opponent to a trickle of runs in a close game.
- Great, another designated hitter. The Tigers can slot him in the DH position and play Gary Sheffield and Carlos Guillen on the left side every day, I guess… But the real reason people are batting around Bonds’ name is they think Gary Sheffield is done.
- Sheffield isn’t done. Sorry but it’s true. He’s going to be given every chance to succeed. I may not like him playing in the field, but we’re playing real baseball here, not fantasyland. You’re not going to cut-and-run with a guy of Sheffield’s proven history. Yet with that salary he’s not being traded either.
- Barry Bonds isn’t working for free. He’s probably not sitting around, waiting for the phone to ring, telling teams he’ll play for pennies on the dollar of what his ability is worth. He’s gonna cost a pretty penny and the Tigers have the second highest payroll already.
You’ll notice I didn’t say “Bonds did steroids!” or any such thing. Fact is, the era was so tainted by steroids, it would be silly to single him out when it’s possible current Tigers may have been involved in PEDs at the same time Bonds was. As well, maybe Bonds can seem repulsive, but we’re rooting for a baseball team here. They’re not all saints. We may think the Tigers all seem like great guys, but who really knows?
Parker has a point or two. Bonds can still hit. He can still get on base. He bats from the left side. All quality points. Ultimately, I return to this: Detroit doesn’t need any more hitters, especially the no-field variety.
If we’re going to argue for signing a big-name, out-of-work ballplayer with a spotty background, it’s not Barry Bonds whose name should come up.
It’s Roger Clemens.
Sphere It
On a team which has 4 players who should play in the field as little as possible (Sheffield, Ordonez, Guillen, Thames), and are better suited as DH’s, adding another makes zero sense. Less than zero, actually. Even if the DH is named Batty Bonds.
Then again, this is coming from Rob Parker, so making sense isn’t expected.
“Batty” Bonds? That’s what I get for not previewing my comment!
And after I went through all the effort of installing a preview button. Why, I never!!
But seriously took like 5 seconds and I never use it either. Even if I did I’d read right through my mistakes.
Great post. Also, dosn’t the fact that Bonds and Sheffield previously had a falling out mean that Sheef would have to be traded/cut in order to minimize any potential clubhouse disruptions between the two? I Cant see any sceneario where taking whatever production Sheff may have left and turning that into a sunk cost is seen as a move in the right direction.
Kurt,
You’ve got to bring the “meh” for tonight’s game. You might even need to bring the mega-meh.
Mega-Meh indeed. Thank god is missed the game. (Too bad I also missed the Scrubs series finale!!)