It has been often said that sport is a microcosm of society in general. On the surface, today’s reality tends to fly in the face of that, mostly because very few of us receive bi-weekly paychecks for half a million dollars.

If you look a little deeper however, you may notice similarities to the rest of the world. In Game of Shadows, the book that ignited this firestorm, it is alleged that Barry Bonds, while at a dinner party at Ken Griffey Jr.'s house in 1998 complained about the lack of attention he had received during the summer of McGwire/Sosa. He'd had a great year, he pointed out, and his contract would soon be up. He wanted to hit homeruns, and he wanted to get paid. He allegedly decided at that moment to juice up.

Now consider it in a different context. How different is that alleged
Bonds decision different from a businessman deciding to use questionable-although not illegal - practices to get a leg up on the competition? The reality is, it's not cut and dry; while there's still ethical issues involved, what constitutes cheating?

We live in a society where cutthroat competition is displayed on virtually every level. The corporate and political world is evidence of this. We've also reached a point as a species where people will eat more maggots than another person on TV to win $25,000.

Some say that the good 'ol days are gone, when pro athletes and others were role models, safely on display from pedestals. But did those days really exist? Was the so-called "Golden Age of Sports" any less competitive than today?

In one way, it was. Players weren't making $15,000,000 a year. Ask yourself sometime if you would bend the rules for that kind of money. Aside from the risk of public castigation, the only serious harm would be to your health. Come to think of it, smokers get both and have to pay for it.

Of course it's a cynical viewpoint - many of us would be comfortable living on the Major League minimum. But if sports is a business, settling for less is not an option. The gruff old baseball manager, and a former Giant, Leo Durocher, supposedly once said "Morals are not an issue with this much money." It was also Durocher who said "As long as I've got a chance to beat you I'm going to take it, nice guys finish last."

You could play devil's advocate all day comparing Bonds' alleged
transgressions to past problems in his own sport. Babe Ruth was a hero despite being a womanizing drunk. The public probably loved him because he wasn't that different from us. Aside from being a dominant athlete, he was jovial everyman with the body of a long-distance trucker. But did MLB threaten to asterisk any of Tim Raines' stolen bases when he was swiping sacks high on blow with the product stashed in his uniform pants so he could snort on the field? Cocaine is a noted energy producer, after all. It's also a dangerous drug, like steroids, that nobody would ever want their kids using - even though it's glamorization in the past decade is unprecedented and explains the scratch marks we've all seen on the toilet paper holders in bathroom stalls at bars.

Obviously you can't blame society for everything. However when the society we live in often contradicts its own supposed mores, anything can be left wide open to interpretation.

What Bonds may or may not have done is not as serious as Pete Rose's gambling either. While he belongs in the Hall of Fame, Rose betting on baseball really did jeopardize the sanctity of the game, even if that sounds like a sanctimonious statement. Bonds clearly wouldn't have been the first athlete to use an illegal substance, was doing what professionals do to get ahead, to attain an edge. Whether it's morally correct or not is for people to decide individually.

Will George Mitchell's investigation result in serious reprecussions? Only time will tell. Many say that when Bonds breaks Hank Aaron's record, it should have that asterisk placed next to it. Not unlike Phil Jackson's comment that the '99 Spurs should have had one. When you think about it, Both arguments hold about the same amount of water. Bonds hasn't helped himself with his attitude towards the media and even his own teammates, but the reality is he's under no obligation to be a nice guy. Yet what goes around comes around, and that, more than his race, will be why the criticism will be so thorough.

Ultimately, whether he did anything wrong or not is almost unconse-quential. Baseball's steroid policy (or lack thereof) prior to last year would absolve him of previous technical guilt. But as Mark McGwire and others discovered, the court of public opinion - sometimes confused with the highest court in the land - doles out multiple convictions and harsh sentences that can make the Iranian judicial system look like The People's Court. And whether it's hypocritical or not, that's the only asterisk he'll need.

John Chick is a member of the significant yet under-represented portion of the Canadian public who don't think hockey is the be-all and end-all of life. John currently works outside of sports at a major Toronto media outlet and lives within an egg's throw of the Blue Jays home, the Rogers Centre (formerly SkyDome). And the egg's throw part is literal, because he's done it.You can reach him at john.chick@atomicsportsmedia.com