Jim Litke AP columnist

In less cynical times, 10 years ago, say, Ryan Howard would have been a great story: A roly-poly kid in just his second season in the bigs closing in fast on Roger Maris’ single-season record of 61 home runs.

Today, it’s not that simple.

Reflecting the current, conflicted state of affairs, some people think Howard isn’t getting enough credit, others that the sinister trinity of Bonds, McGwire and Sosa has already been there and ruined that for everyone else. A suspicious few have even questioned whether Howard, despite appearances and his bona fides as a minor league slugger already established, is part of that unholy performance-enhancing alliance himself.

“I just think it (stinks),” Howard responded recently to the whispers that attach themselves to anybody accomplishing anything out of the ordinary in baseball anymore.

“The thing about it is, if you’re going to make those kinds of comments, have proof,” he added. “Otherwise, you can ruin people’s reputations.”

It’s already too late for that, and the 26-year-old Phillies first baseman has a decade’s worth of elders — pitchers as well as hitters, not to mention loopholes in the drug-testing policy — to blame. Seeing still isn’t the same thing as believing in baseball, and might never be.

Perhaps because we’ve been scouring everything for several seasons now — leaked grand jury testimony, the bags of pharmaceuticals the feds found while raiding former Diamondbacks pitcher Jason Grimsley’s home-based business, even the factories where baseballs are wound tighter than ever and bats cured to a hardness unimaginable a few years ago — and the pictures still come back fuzzy.

There’s still no tests to detect human growth hormone, for example, and players still aren’t tested randomly or regularly enough to certify anyone as clean.

In the absence of clarity, what some people have resorted to is proposing rolling back the record to Maris, effectively wiping out the stretch of four years when McGwire, Sosa and Bonds bettered it six times, playing “Can you top this?” until Bonds finally planted a flag all the way out at 73. Not surprising, the Maris family are among its strongest backers.

Special feature Reuters Stretch run: Breaking down MLB playoff races

Rich Maris, the fifth of the late Roger Maris’ six kids, was part of the moveable feast caught up in the 1998 home-run race between McGwire and Sosa. He doesn’t regret everything that happened in those few dizzying weeks, just most of it.

“We were along for the ride like the rest of the country,” he told Yahoo! Sports on Tuesday. “Every time McGwire hit one, it was like, ‘Wow, he did it again.’

“And now you just look at that,” Maris added, “and laugh.”