Who was better--Mays or Bonds?
This is just a one-on-one match race for best Giant ever...no Ruth or Mantle or Aaron, just Willie and Barry. And it's a tough call. Say you want to avoid talking about steroids. Fine. You limit Bonds to the years 1993-99, then...versus Willie's best seven-year stretch, say 1960-66. You might choose Willie, because of the low-scoring era back then, when runs were less cheap. And because he was a center fielder, as opposed to a left fielder. But the years 2000-04 are still part of baseball history, and the games Bonds played are all on the books. The games he won for the Giants still count. And even if he was juicing--still--he was in his late 30s. How could he have been *that* much better than everybody else, steroids or no steroids? Especially since we don't know who else was--or wasn't--juicing in the same period, and probably will never know? And exactly how much of his numbers in those years can be attributed to steroids? (For what it's worth, my feeling is that the whole thing has been greatly overblown.) And another factor needs to be considered--the persistent rumors regarding Willie and amphetamines, which I well recall hearing about back in the 1960s. Are amphetamines somehow less evil than steroids? And there is, to be strict, no evidence that Barry ever used steroids, though I think the circumstantial case is convincing. I was a huge Giants fan in the 60s, and Willie was my idol, but I have to choose Barry. Only Ruth can match what he did from 2000-04...
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