Official argue about all things Barry Bonds GOAT thread

[manbearpig]

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Its pretty std that exceptional players don't follow normal peak/decline phases. Look at Ted Williams and Mariano Rivera.

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Right, but he got better as he got older. He didn't maintain. His power numbers increased dramatically as he got older, especially when you consider the deflating aspect of Pac Bell/SBC, at the same time as his supposed foray into PED's.

[samsonh]

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Very similar to the rugby argument you had where neglected to add that the competition was only among 4 teams.

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You know, not to steer too much off-topic, but you got to be three shingles short of a roof or something if you are really making this argument.

1. OP makes thread about hypothetical group of american football players getting 6 months to prepare and being able to compete on national stage in rugby.

2. RedBean posts excerpt from article detailing historical event in which group of american football players get 6 months to prepare and go on to win on national stage in rugby.

3. Guys like you cry foul "ITS NOT THE SAME! NOT EVEN CLOSE! YOU DIDN'T MENTION IT WAS ONLY 4 TEAMS! YOU ARE DISHONEST!"

4. To which I post the link to the entire article I cited, pointing out that no where does it mention there were only 4 teams...something I was sincerely unaware of outside that piece....despite it not fundamentally changing the substance of the similarity.....and I reiterate that I am not drawing any conclusion, I just thought those interested in the discussion would find an extremely similar situation to be somewhat interesting and worth a read.

5. To which guys like you stomp your feet and flail your arms and insist I am "dishonest".....for my posting of historical fact.

I mean, seriously.

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FYI,
I completely agree that the football players would win. The first clip of rugby I have ever seen was the Youtube clip that was posted. You shouldn't assume things.

You never said Hank was a habitual user, yet you classified him as a drug cheat. Had you then mentioned that he only used once it would be different, but you conveniently left that for others to reveal.

I'll give you that the Clear was not illegal, but only because the knowledge of the Clear did not exist. The first that authorities knew about the Clear was when Graham mailed in a sample. Yet again it comes back to the spirit of the rule. Did Bonds violate steroid policy? Maybe not. But only because the policy was not up to date. And you seem willing to admit that point...

[chev9]

Marcus Allen was at his party? Barry must be a good guy. Marcus wouldn't hang out with bad people, you know other than OJ Simpson anyway.

Put me in the camp that thinks Barry is one of the GOAT, if not the greatest, has no problem with the steroids, yet thinks there's a 99% chance he's a complete douchebag.

[vhawk01]

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The only problem I have with your reasoning here is this: you constantly harp about Hank admitting his use of 'greenies' and then you trot him out for this example. You can't have it both ways here. He is either dirty as you often claim or he is clean and the precedent for Bonds.

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Why do you insist that I simplify Hank Aaron as either "dirty" or "clean"?

Hank is a great baseball player who hit a ton of homeruns and admitted to using greenies once.

It is what it is....no more, no less.

I certainly don't think Hank Aaron is a dirty baseball player, nor do I think greenies aided in any of his 755 homeruns. My apologies if you got that impression.

In fact, Hank is a great baseball player who admitted using greenies once.

Willie Mays did the same, as did Mike Schmidt, and I certainly don't think either of them are dirty either.

I simply acnowledge that it is what it is...without feeling the need to oversimplify a man of great accomplishment into a digital "dirty" or "clean" label.

Granted, I pointed out Hank's use to highlight the hypocrisy in the media, as they refused to print even a mention of his prior admission during the entire chase, calling him the epitome of clean.

And when I originally posted the hypothetical of a ballplayer who took PED's just once, the consensus was that one time made someone a cheater.....until they discovered the example was Hank Aaron, and then the hypocrisy kicked in....

Funny how that works, huh?

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And the reason I call you intellectually dishonest is the way you characterize hank differently in each post. You act like hes a cheater when it suits your needs and like hes clean when it doesn't. You only admitted Hank used greenies once after that was brought to your attention. You were trying to say he was a habitual, admitted user and got called out on it.

There are several things with your Bonds arguements that bother me. I don't care either way since I hate baseball and find it extremely boring. But when you say Bonds never tested positive as proof of something it blows my mind. The big thing about the Clear was that it was supposed to not be detected. So many designer steroids are designed to pass tests that most steroid tests become meaningless. So Bonds testing positive is not something that completely clears as you seem to believe.

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I think you are reading into his posts a lot more than what is there. He points out that Aaron used greenies, and TO YOU he is labelling him as a "cheater." He points out that Aaron had a late-career surge and TO YOU he is saying clean players can do it too. In reality he is just describing reality and letting you draw your own conclusions. Your response here is funny because its pretty much EXACTLY what he is talking about above, your need to place him neatly into some binary category of "clean" or "dirty."

[manbearpig]

Interesting sidenote:

If Bonds is listed in the Mitchell report, does that change any minds about the probabilites of BB using some sort of PED?

I guess rephrased, does the Mitchell report carry with it any credibility in your mind?

[Vyse]

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Its pretty std that exceptional players don't follow normal peak/decline phases. Look at Ted Williams and Mariano Rivera.

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It's also pretty standard that even exceptional players don't perform at a sustained level of excellence for a dozen or so years and then, at age 36, have a streak of their best four seasons, which are the four best consecutive offensive seasons in the history of baseball, with no one even coming remotely close.

Bonds averaged 14.9 WARP3 from Age 36 to Age 39. If you take into account just offense, his EqA jumps from a previous career high of .364 to a new career high of .427 at 36, then again with .453 at 37, a slight drop to .412 at 38, and his third career high in EqA in four years at age 39 with a .457 mark. Babe Ruth, the only offensive player who ever came close to Bonds, has a career high EqA of .415, and topped .400 just one other time.

If you can provide just one example of an all-time great boosting his EqA by an average of 75 points a season from his full-time productive Age 35 season for the next four seasons, then maybe you have a point. Hell, if you can provide ONE example of an all-time Hall of Fame player still performing at his established career Hall of Fame level at age 35, and then ratchet it up ANOTHER level to shatter all-time offensive marks never before even approached, any time after that age 35 season, maybe you'll have the beginnings of a point.

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But even with the previous findings, only Bonds has gotten WAYYY better after age 35, his increase in HR rate is unprecedented.

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Never let it be said that RedBean is an idiot. You don't have to be a genius to pick up on the operative words RedBean has used throughout the entire argument. He's set your fallacious up for failure.

Notice what he says here. Home run rate. Well, maybe if it was JUST Bonds' home run rate that increased, you'd have a point. Maybe if he just aged gracefully like many other great sluggers, having great and good years but slowly declining, but still hitting a ton of home runs, it wouldn't be an argument in the opposition's favor. But Bonds had the greatest offensive seasons in the long, storied history of baseball. Not only that, no one else came remotely close. Hmm, I bet if we take the greatest individual seasons in baseball history, what will the average age of those players be? I kind of doubt it will be 36, 37, 38 and 39, don't you?

I really don't give two [censored] about this argument because, as I've made clear, athletes' personalities or allegations or whatever in regards to their career are, for the most part, irrelevant to me. Even "cheating" doesn't mean that much to me. It's mostly just an image and a story crafted by the media and romanticized in the heads of sports fans.

But it just shows the incompetence of the people even debating against RedBean that they aren't raising this point again and again and again and hammering it home and dismissing laughable statements like "Its pretty std that exceptional players don't follow normal peak/decline phases." Yes, that's standard, but too bad we're not talking about normal peak / decline phases, we're talking about a 35-year-old turning into, at age 36, the greatest offensive machine that baseball could ever hope to see, and then topping it at age 37, and then topping it again at age 39. The whole "but look! this hall of famer didn't decline after 35! and look! hank aaron had the same HR boost after 35!" is entirely, absolutely irrelevant because we're not just looking at Bonds' home runs per at-bat (which you're of course not adjusting for playing in the most brutal park for lefties in the game). It's not valid to just point out other great players' production in their late careers, because unless they suddenly dwarved all of their offensive production at ages 36 and on, it's not relevant.

Barry Bonds went from an all-time great to the all-time greatest. Comparing that to an all-time great merely sustaining all-time great production, or all-time great production moderately improving, or improving for one season, or having an amazing year after an injury shortened one, or whatever is not relevant to what Bonds did.

"The stats merely show Bonds is among the best."

Wrong. The stats merely show that Bonds managed to increase his then-top-10-all-time production to first-place-all-time by destroying all previous offensive contributions the previous fifteen years of his career. Toss in the fact that he did this at age 36, 37, 38 and 39 and it's simply preposterous to even ponder, and there's no possible way to overrate how incredible and beyond belief Barry Bonds was.

Hence the suspicion.

[Vyse]

"In the park's first four years, Bonds hit 0.954 homers at home for every one on the road. Think about that--as amazing as his feats have been, his numbers may still be limited by his home park. The Giants and their opponents have suffered even more, hitting only 0.706 homers there for every homer elsewhere. Some might point to darker explanations for Barry's ability to overcome his park, but his achievements deserve some appreciation as well. If he eventually passes Aaron for the top spot, it won't be because of his environment, it will be in spite of it."

A nice except from the link manbearpig posted.

[RedBean]

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This post should cover all your Hank Aaron comparisons:

park effects.

And a linky for you: http://www.baseballprospectus.com/ar...articleid=2795

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Hank definately benefited from HOME park effects at the launching pad, as the article shows.

But...it doesn't "cover all the comparisions" for his late career surge...considering he played half his games AWAY from the home stadium, and through the magic of statistical splits, we can quantify the difference over the same time period independent of his home park.

Let's look at what Hank did over the same time period, away from Fulton County.

AB/HR on the ROAD:
Age 30-34: 19.77
Age 35-39: 14.22

A HUGE increase in ROAD HR Rate.

Oops...

[RedBean]

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Bonds as he got older got bigger/fatter and slower. He's no longer able to hit as many singles as before, which means his hr/h could increase drastically without even gaining power/homers.

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Right, except for he did gain power.

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To which you immediately assume it must be the result of steroids, and neglect any effects from expansion resulting in watered down pitching, leaguewide trends in increased homerun rate, and the switch to maple bats from ash.

But hey, don't let anything that might disagree with your self-fulfilling opinion get in the way. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[RedBean]

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Right, but he got better as he got older. He didn't maintain. His power numbers increased dramatically as he got older,

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So did Hank's.