A caller on KNBR today made a pretty good point:

The total number of HR's (756, 800 wutever it ends up with)...that isn't the most sacred record anymore.

What might never be broken is the length of being home run king. How long did Ruth hold the record? 50, 60 years? Aaron only held it for what, 30?

Will whatever the record Bonds sets hold up for half a century? Doubtful.

Say what you want about steroids but Barry's home run record as well as his career should be celebrated.

It is just ignorant to compare records from different eras in my opinion. Babe Ruth hit 714 homers against only white players so shouldn't that have an asterisk? Roger Maris broke the single season home run record in more games than the Babe, does that mean he should have an asterisk next to his total? Barry was the best player in an era where maybe 30-40% of the players were "juiced".

I personally think Barry's record should be celebrated and that the media, in need of stories, completely over exaggerates Barry's alleged steroid use. Much of the hate that Barry receives is from his unwillingness to talk to the media. Wouldn't it be interesting if we find out someone well-liked broke a big record while using steroids. What if Cal Ripken had been using steroids during his crazy long consecutive games played streak? I'm sure everyone would still love him. The difference is that the media write articles about Barry that paint a bad public image and thus Barry is hated.

Also, I don't think steroids is going away anytime soon. It's amazing how science evolves. Steroids will probably become completely undetectable with no side effects and of course, every professional athlete will take them. So let's just celebrate Barry's home run record because the future is going to be more and more "tainted".

I'm somewhere in between the options of voting.

My logic might be a bit off here, but I think of it this way: if Barry Bonds did indeed use steroids (which I think he did) it was detrimental to his career to do so in the first place. I argue that he probably shaved off a couple more years of playing due to his abuse of steroids.

The logic that he hit these home runs because of the steroids is absolutely retarded and people should get shot for thinking that way. Steroids does not make you a good player, period. It might make you better, but Barry was legendary before there was ever evidence or finger pointing at him for using in the first place.

This is a first ballot hall of famer that people are using as a scapegoat for the entire steroid era of baseball. He was, is, and in my eyes always will be a great great player, and he deserves every bit of credit (although casted in a shadow of doubt and hate) that he deserves. Congratulations sir. You're the best the game has ever seen.

Never admitted to taking steroids, or the cream/clear.  A lot of people probably are just going off ESPN's butchered interpretation of the leaked grand jury testimony.  He admitted to taking flaxseed oil and a balm, prosecutors said they sounded like the cream and clear and pressed Bonds on it.  Bonds said the only way he could have taken them is "unknowingly" which he didn't think was possible.

If he admitted to taking roids, he would not be being chased for perjury.

Anyways, hats off to Barry.  An amazing accomplishment.

Has anybody else noticed how basically EVERYONE in the baseball world is trying to very-subtley undermine Barry's chase of the record.  Every time somebody else hits a homerun, ESPN just HAS to mention how many career homeruns they have and how great they are.  And some other stadiums now keep a home run ticker for their hometown slugger, like 400 homeruns at the twilight of someone's career is THAT record-breaking.

Also here comes all the talk about A-Rod and how much better he is than Barry.  I like how people who've never known anything about baseball watch Sportscenter and compare a young fast active A-Rod to a slow aging 43 year old Bonds and assume A-Rod is better in everything that Bonds ever did in his career.  The average Bonds hater doesn't know about Barry Bonds' perennial gold glove awards, 500+ stolen bases, 2500+ career walks, and utter domination of the league BEFORE any of the steroid allegations.

People want to put an asterisk next to the HR-record, but you can always make excuses for anything.  How about the fact that, relative to A-Rod, Barry Bonds has barely got anything to hit over his career.  A-Rod gets pitched to because he's batting in a loaded Yankees lineup, he's only been walked nearly 900 times.  So if A-rod eventually breaks the record, we can put an asterisk next to his name saying if Bonds didn't get walked as much he would've had more HR's.  That's absurdity.  There should be no asterisk.  756 HR is 756 HR.

On the other hand, if Bonds really did knowingly take steroids, it's kind of a shame.  He would've been known as one of baseball's greatest players ever either way.

...Barry Bonds is, at 43, a valuable and disruptive force in any game in which he plays. It is my strong suspicion that he'll play another two, maybe even three years, hopefully not with the Giants, who need a dose of youth like Don Nelson needs a drink.

A lot of the numbers Bonds has accumulated are staggering. Besides the home run record, he's also the all time walk king, intentional walks, single season OPS, a forty/forty player... the list goes on.

Based on the achievements he notched before he ever chose to use steroids, he is, by any objective measure, a hall of fame baseball player.

Then again, there's that steroid thing.

Did Bonds take steroids? Yeah, he did. It's as obvious to me as anything. Barry Bonds was a pretty skinny guy. His rookie season he looked like Richard Pryor in a Pittsburgh uni. It's been printed that his head and foot sizes have grown in his middle age, a common symptom of HGH abuse. He was busted for amphetamine use. Leaked grnad jury testimony reveals he admitted to using substances he claims he thought were flaxseed and arthritis rub, when they were in fact BALCO's superjuice.

What bothers me about this most is that I don't necessarily buy the frequent argument of these drugs not helping you hit a baseball, and it's a feeling that is highlighted by Bonds' late career highs not marked "HR." For instance, Bonds' batting averages rise precipitously after he is thought to have started using - mind you, his career batting average is under .300, at only .298, and yet from 2001 to 2004 he went for .328, .370, .341, and .362, netting himself four straight MVP awards. I have heard many different takes on the steroid issue, and last month heard an interview with a personal trainer who speculated that new designer steroids do in fact improve both the strength and the twitch reflexes of muscle enough to where hand-eye coordination, and presumably bat speed would improve.

Essentially, the distressing thing is that we'll never know what Bonds might have been without steroids, because that would've been so much more pure and interesting than what he is. In the modern game of baseball, there are too many players who are one dimensional sluggers, and Bonds was beautiful in that he wasn't; he was practically godlike in all facets of the game (with the possible exception of hustle). If Bonds hadn't bulked up, he certainly would not be the all time home run king. The nature of an aging body wouldn't allow it, because his skills would deteriorate as they should, and as we've seen the last couple years to a limited extent. But who's to say he couldn't have reached the 600/600 SB/HR mark? Would that be so unimpressive?

Ultimately, I guess none of this matters, because it's all theoretical... and when people ask me who I think is the home run king, I'll say Bonds, because he is, and even if he is a steroid popping jerk, I can't deny him the title he's essentially mortgaged the likelihood of a long, healthy adulthood for. My greatest pity in all this is that I can't properly assess how good a clean Bonds would've been for how long, because that realization of how otherworldly an athlete a baseball player can be would be so much more significant for the game than this record will be.

An interesting point on KNBR last night: whatever you think of what Bonds did or didn't take, with regard the steroids, neither Ruth nor Aaron ever faced pitchers who has taken steroids.
I also saw somewhere on the web, although I can't recall exactly where, a statistical look at Aaron's homerun total had he played today (during the same years as Bonds).  They said his HR total would have been more, but it was only like 766.  The interesting thing there was although their careers are only one year different at this point (Aaron played 1 year less than Bonds has to this point, I think), Bonds has significantly less at bats than Aaron.  Still interesting to think about how many he would have hit had he had the luxury of actually being pitched to - not so much this year, but how much sooner would he have done this if he was actually being pitched to over the last 5 years?

It's cool to see the majority of the responses being thoughtful ones,   while i'm sure OptionZero's disclaimer helped, it's still cool. What can be considered the most hallowed record in sports? Is it the home run record still, or is it something else?

right now if it wasn't for steroids/human growth hormone nor would he have had that late surge in his career.  dude was a great player but he cheated the game end of story.

Just like Vick. It's a shame that most people in America and most of the media are crucifying these guys before anything is actually proved

Barry Bonds deserves lots of credit for breaking one of the biggest records in any sport. He is simply a great HR hitter and people who criticise him and try and frame him are jealous of that. If he is on drugs than people like me will be sad and disappointed in him. He hasn't been proven to being on drugs, however, so he is not guilty, simple as that.

he did deny ever blaming it on Sweeney and I'm not sure why he would blame someone else and then retract his statement immediately. It could just be the media trying to make up stories about him and of course everyone would believe the stories rather than the man himself.