Warning!! Danger!! Annual Off-topic Baseball Thread '07!! Beware!!

[bgtg19]

Originally Posted by tomegun

JR, I feel the way I do about Bonds because I have actually met him and made my opinion based on how he treated me.

Yes, how Bonds treats people is an excellent source upon which to base your opinion. But perhaps you might consider that there are other people in the world in addition to you. I'm glad he treated you well. I'm confident that there are other people who have been treated well by Bonds. Bonds, like all humans, is no doubt a complex person with good and bad traits, good and bad days, etc.

If I met Phil Spector and he treated me well should I think well of him despite the large mountain of evidence that he treated many, many women incredibly poorly (even if you don't think he killed Ms. Clarkson)? If I met Curtis Granderson and he was short with me should I think ill of him despite the large mountain of evidence that he treats people with generosity, respect and dignity?

O.K., forget how Bonds treats people in the media. (Although, to be fair, if you are going to think of athletes as mere humans shouldn't you also think of journalists as humans? If someone in the media treated his father poorly, should Bonds stereotype ALL journalists and treat them all ill? Or is it an acceptable standard of decency to treat people as individuals? If Mike Winters treated me nicely when I met him at a baseball camp, should I whine at the media criticism of his out-of-line conduct? Or when he makes a mistake should I dislike all umpires? But I digress....) Yes, forget how Bonds treats the media. How does he treat his fellow players? How did he treat Gary Sheffield? What would prompt Sheffield to state: "I never wished anything bad on [Bonds]. I want him to achieve what he wants to achieve, but what I want more is that his life gets right. That he can have compassion for other people. And that's what I want the most."?