In light of Barry Bonds’ unwelcome assault on 755, the most hallowed number in sports, I started reflecting on the entire Steroid Era that hangs like a dark cloud over Major League Baseball. Thing is, Bud Selig knows this cloud ain’t going anywhere anytime soon. (Did you see his body language as he witnessed Bonds’ tie his good buddy Hank Aaron? No clapping, hands in pockets…I honestly thought the guy wanted to yawn. Or cry. Tough to tell.)

As much as I hate to see Aaron’s name stricken from the record book, you have to acknowledge Bonds as the home run king, legit or not. Let’s face it; Bonds was an otherworldly talent before steroids. The juice just took him from Hall of Famer to one of the two best players ever. Period. That said, it is something of a travesty that a person of grace and dignity like Aaron will be surpassed in our collective consciousness by a clod like Bonds. But what else do you do? You can’t “asterisk” the record. Not unless you also asterisk the entire era. Which is what I might do if I were the commissioner.

I came across this website called Baseball’s Steroids Era. Really fascinating stuff. They list all the usual suspects we’ve known about for years (Palmeiro, Giambi, McGwire, Clemens, Tejada) but the site also chronicles the steroid use of players whose names I’d never heard in conjunction with these allegations. (Wally Joyner? Really? Don’t remember the news coverage on that one.) If anything, the site sheds light on the ever-increasing number of players from the past 20 years who used performance-enhancing drugs. Again, with such rampant steroid use, why single out Bonds? In essence, the entire era (and its dubious numbers: 70, 73, 760 or wherever Bonds ends up…) deserves an asterisk.

In a game that values its numbers like baseball does, that seems to be the only solution*.

*By solution, I mean “way of keeping the storm clouds at bay just a little longer”.