Some Thoughts on Baseball Before I Leave You

First of all, the Sports Desk is going to be closed for about ten days as of today. Have no fear we will re-open for business upon my return from holiday. In the meantime I wanted to leave you with a few thoughts about baseball to mull over in my absence.

Firstly, Barry Bonds is now 10 home runs shy of baseball's most hallowed record, Hank Aaron's all-time home run record. It's now 755 for Aaron and 745 for Bonds. I'm really hoping that Bonds does not break the record in the next 10 days but it is definite possibility that he will. It is pretty sad that baseball's biggest cheater is going to break baseball's biggest record.

Now there has never been any proof that Bonds cheated and took performance-enhancing substances (steroids) but I think the circumstantial evidence speaks for itself. Look at the picture to the left. On the left of the split is Barry Bonds, circa the early 90's, when he was approximately 30 years old. On the right of the split is Barry as he appears today, nearing age 44. As medical science can probably confirm it is nearly impossible for an increase of this magnitude to occur naturally in a man of middle age. The difference in the 'two' Bonds is just staggering when you look at them side by side like this.

In other baseball news, the Toronto Blue Jays are entrenched in last place in the A.L East and have the potential to be historically bad. They have lost 8 games in a row and if they lose tonight to the Red Sox they will fall 10.5 games behind first place. And I'll tell you right now, if they lose tonight, they are finished - done like dinner. I know there's still like 130 games left in the season but they way they look, they're out of the playoff picture already. I suppose that's what you get when you have a lineup build for power that isn't hitting or scoring runs and a pitching staff (beyond Roy Halladay) that is just laughable. I guess not picking up a marquee pitcher in the off season was not the best career move for Jays GM J.P Riccardi. If this losing lasts much longer, I don't expect Manager John Gibbons will be around by the time I get back.

The last baseball item is Pinch Hitter-related. The bar has now been set a little higher. My new high-score is 46,263 and change, so top that (when I posted that score I had it up over 71,000 but a crushing strikeout ruined everything - I was waiting for an off-speed pitch and he blew the fastball right by me).

Oh and the 70 second solitaire win is an impossibility. I can't even get through the deck once in 70 seconds.

See you in 10 days.