Who wouldn’t pay to see Bonds play again?

Barry Bonds’ agent is saying he’s all but done since he’s been out of baseball for two years without a contract offer, but how crazy would it be to see Bonds play right now?

I’ve been anti-Bonds and anti-roids for a while now, but even I’m starting to realize that Bonds wasn’t just among a select group of guys that made the decision to cheat. If anything, Bonds got a late jump on his peers if the suspicions are right that he started juicing after the 1998 Home Run Chase. At this point in the game, if you’re anti-Bonds, you might as well be anti-MLB for the same reasons.

There’s no real reason to deny him an opportunity to play given that so many of the other suspected and even admitted roid-users have kept their jobs. I’m not gonna get all Stephen A. Smith on you and act like Bonds is owed something or needs a pity party because the man made a decision and is dealing with the consequences, but I’d still love to see him back in the game right now.

There are two reasons why I’m moved to lead the charge to get him back in the game: 1) Steroids or no, he was the greatest baseball player ever. Period. And 2) I just realized he’s 45 and would love to see what he looks like at the plate after a two-year layoff.

I’m positive it wouldn’t take more than $800,000 to sign this guy and it’s almost guaranteed that people would flock to the stadium to see the greatest baseball player of all time step into the box after sitting at home for two years. I’d put it up there with Tyson or Ali returning to the ring and as much press as Favre coming back drew, could you imagine how nuts a Bonds comeback would be in the sports world in 2010?

Most of what would make his signing with a team this year more exciting than the past two years…is that he hasn’t played in two years. We pretty much knew what he would have had coming back in 2008, and even at his age, taking a year off wouldn’t have been that awful. But I think two years is pretty much the cutoff and his agent is right to say it’s now or never.

Even if he were to come back, it’s probably out of the question for him to return to National League — unless he’s brought on in a Jim Thome or Jason Giambi role of the power bat off the bench (and nothing else) for the entire year — but there are a ton of struggling clubs that could use the attendance boost Bonds would bring.

I refuse to believe that Barry Bonds is still more hated among baseball fans than Vick is among football fans and people have all but moved on with the Vick hate already. After seeing how the Vick experiment has gone so far, I’d say a team like the Athletics are fools for not offering Bonds a minimum deal. For $800,000 or less, you’d get asses in the seats for the first time in that town since before the ’94 strike.

I know I’d probably hate the guy if I met him, but there are few people on this planet that I would stop everything I’m doing to watch play a sport and Barry Lamar Bonds easily tops that list.

If you can't break the schneid, swallow your freaking pride

Jimmy Rollins returned from his four-game sabbatical to go 0-for-5 with two strikeouts from the leadoff spot in the Phillies 5-4 loss to the Braves on Tuesday.

While Rollins continues to flop like no other when he bats leadoff, he turns into a roided-up Barry Bonds (redundant?) when batting elsewhere. He is 9-for-22 (.409 AVG) with three home runs, two walks and zero strikeouts when he bats anywhere else in the lineup this season. He is a .191 hitter in 282 at bats when in the leadoff spot.

“I’m a leadoff hitter, plain and simple,” said Rollins, who was probably one of those ‘square peg in the round hole’ kids growing up. “Pulling me from the leadoff spot would be like telling Will Ferrell to stop acting or Andre Iguodala to stop shooting threes. It’s just not gonna happen.”

Rollins will once again try to make that tiny leadoff glove fit as the Phillies take on the Braves tonight at 7:10pm ET.

Controversy bound to hover over Moyer's pursuit of all-time home run record

Jamie Moyer lost another bid for his 250th career win in Monday’s 5-3 loss to the Marlins, but inched closer to becoming baseball’s all-time home run [given up] leader.

The fourth-inning jack by Wes Helms gave Moyer 477 for his career, 28 behind Phillies great Robin Roberts’ 505 for the all-time record, which could fall later this season.

“If Moyer gets to 506, baseball purists may put an asterisk by his name in the record books,” said ESPN’s Buster Olney. “There’s no doubt that his totals were inflated by steroid use, even if Moyer wasn’t the one actually taking them.”

Moyer has surrendered a slew of home runs to outed and suspected steroid users over the years including Manny Ramirez (10), Alex Rodriguez (6), Barry Bonds (5), Rafael Palmeiro (5), Brady Anderson (5), Juan Gonzalez (4) and Lenny Dykstra (1).

Meanwhile, Roberts was lit up by a far more respectable bunch, including Duke Snider (19), Hank Aaron (9),  Jackie Robinson (9) and the ever-dangerous Wally Moon (9).

“I can’t help that every record nowadays has steroids attached to it,” said Moyer. “Did a lot of my home runs come from the bats of known steroid users? Yes. Could I allow 500 home runs without them? Probably.”

Manny’s ovarian issues highlight growing problem in MLB

Manny Ramirez will be suspended for 50 games after using a women’s fertility drug prescribed by his doctor. The Dodgers outfielder has apparently struggled alongside countless other women in this country with pregnancy issues, which places Ramirez on the growing list of major league players now known to have lady bits.

Ramirez has repeatedly denied use of any performance enhancing drugs, but will not appeal the suspension and subsequent loss of $7.7 million in salary “out of respect to the system, and let’s be real here … I was gonna hang it up for at least 50 games this season anyway, so it kinda works out,” according to Ramirez.

Alex Rodriguez was also recently caught with his vag showing by denying steroid use on national television in 2007 and admitting to steroid use on national television two years later this past February.

Rodriguez and Ramirez are only part of a larger, growing list of high-profile athletes that have traded in their jocks for tampons, including Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Rafael Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa and Mark McGwire. Each player was once thought to be a first-ballot Hall of Famer, but will now be denied entrance by baseball writers due to their lack of any semblance of male reproductive organs.

“These guys masqueraded around for years like they were in the same boat as greats like Mays, Aaron and Ted Williams, but one by one we’re finding out the truth about these frauds,” said LA Times writer Bill Plaschke. “It’s not so much the fact that they have snatches that really bothers me about it … just the fact that they lied about it this whole time, you know what I mean?”

Albert Pujols is expected to be named to the list in the coming days or years, at which time Major League Baseball will officially be forced to erase 96.2% of its record book from 1994 to 2007.