Unsympathetic figure

HOUSTON – Victim Barry is tired. He said he sleeps all the time, and occasionally a mistress isn't even involved.

Victim Barry is haunted. He said the ghost of Babe Ruth is hovering over him, shaking his concentration as he tries to hit his 714th home run that will tie him with Ruth for second on the all-time list.

Victim Barry is old. Being 41 is taking a toll. "It's harder when you get older," Bonds said the other day. In fact, he is so physically unimposing now that an anonymous Houston Astros middle reliever had no fear of beaning him Tuesday, essentially daring him to do something about it. Not that there was going to be any cavalry charge from the San Francisco Giants' dugout.

Victim Barry is hurt. Those bum knees are grinding as he tries to get around on a fastball or chase a fly ball. "My knees get sore," he said. "As you go on, as the innings go on, I get tireder and tireder."

Victim Barry is sick of the sideshow. He's tired of all the fans dressed as syringes or holding signs that say nasty things about him. He's tired of all the media waiting to chronicle history. He's tired, we presume, of the cracks about his expanding head and shrinking, well, you know what they warn about steroids.

"I'm trying to send you home," Victim Barry said before Tuesday's game at Minute Maid Park. We appreciated the fact he was thinking of the media, what with perjury charges, IRS investigations and a mega-slump hanging over him.

He didn't hit No. 714, though, failing to homer for the eighth consecutive game. However, he did go 2-for-4 in the Giants' 14-3 demolishing of the Astros.

Poor Victim Barry. All this adversity and frustration is enough to make you cry harder than the ESPN executives who thought "Bonds on Bonds" was a sure-bet ratings winner.

Of course, Barry Bonds is so bad at public relations that even his victim whine won't work with anyone but the softest of hearts.

Everyone knows Victim Barry is no victim but rather the master of his completely bizarre present existence. The fact is that Bonds wouldn't be in this situation without performance-enhancing drugs, which even the Flat Earth Society no longer alleges but takes as near-irrefutable fact.

We aren't talking about the drugs drawing the catcalls and "cheater" signs. The reality is that without the syringe shots, he wouldn't be anywhere near Babe Ruth and Henry Aaron.

It was, according to the best-selling book "Game of Shadows," the drugs designed for AIDS patients, infertile women and narcoleptics (among other illegal substances) that made him go from slugging a homer every 16.1 at-bats to every 8.5 at-bats. (Bonds currently hasn't hit a home run in 26 at-bats.)

Without the drugs, Bonds would have been a Hall of Fame player and one of the all-time great sluggers. But right now, he'd be sitting quietly on 575 home runs, or 602, or maybe even 638. He sure wouldn't be at 713. He wouldn't be close.

The 700 club is rarified air for two reasons – physical skill and mental toughness. Henry Aaron had both. Babe Ruth, too. Bonds? He was a pretender to begin with – one who now is crumbling from the weight of trying to fake it without Victor Conte cooking him up a fresh cocktail.

Bonds is on an island now, with nowhere to hide and no one to blame but himself as the past smacks him in the face like a bleacher "steroid" chant.

In "Love Me, Hate Me," the new Bonds biography by Jeff Pearlman, story after story of Bonds' crassness is detailed in a portrait of the truly pathetic.

It isn't just that Bonds refused to sign a ball for a cystic fibrosis charity run by former teammate Brian Fisher in honor of Fisher's young son who died from the disease. It is that Bonds snarled at the request with a "[expletive] you and [expletive] Brian Fisher."

It isn't just that Bonds refused to help with a fundraiser for the devastated families of two Pittsburgh Pirates groundskeepers who died without warning. It is that he treated the request for some memorabilia to auction with disgust and more expletives.

"The Pirates' team photographer, Pete Diana, said he wished Barry Bonds was dead," Pearlman said on Tuesday.

It isn't just the scenes of Bonds sitting in the clubhouse and purposely peeling off a pair of dirty socks and dropping them on the floor – rather than tossing them in the hamper right next to him – and then calling over a low-paid stadium worker to pick them up. It is that when the worker did pick up the socks, Bonds, a second-generation millionaire who was born and raised in extreme privilege, would then throw his underwear down and call the guy back.

The fans who believe Bonds ever would treat them any differently – drawing pleasure from watching them pick up his laundry or being hurtful in the wake of their child's death – are more naive than the ones who think he didn't juice.

"He was worse than I thought when I started [reporting the book]," Pearlman said. "He learned at an early age that if you are a good athlete, you can do whatever you want."

Until now, it seems. His public image isn't coming back. Not even ESPN's apologists can save him. His intimidation is gone, leaving Astros pitcher Russ Springer to go high and inside Tuesday until he nailed Bonds in the shoulder to receive an ejection from the home-plate umpire and a standing ovation from the hometown fans.

All that is left is Victim Barry, whining about creaky knees and exhaustion and the unyielding pressure of a life he so willingly, wantonly chose.

It would be so pathetic, if it wasn't so perfect.

Dan Wetzel is Yahoo! Sports' national columnist. Follow him on Twitter. Send Dan a question or comment for potential use in a future column or webcast.

Updated on Wednesday, May 17, 2006 1:50 am, EDT

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