OPINION

By Richard Justice

updated 2:59 p.m. ET Aug. 17, 2008

Almost any logical person would conclude that baseball decided it wanted nothing more to do with Barry Lamar Bonds. Is this the Son of Collusion? Does Bonds have a case?

If a dozen baseball owners gathered in a room, you could not get them to agree on anything. Not one thing. Not what to order for breakfast. Not how to hold a soup spoon.

Yet when baseball's divisional and wild-card races were wide open, when as many as a dozen teams seemed capable of winning a championship, these baseball men all agreed that Barry Bonds wasn't for them.

Could Bonds have helped them win a championship? Sure he could have. They wouldn't even argue that point.

The Tampa Bay Rays, Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, Houston Astros, Los Angeles Dodgers, Arizona Diamondbacks and other teams have had a desperate need for offense at various times. The Diamondbacks and Red Sox and Dodgers traded for it.

And they surrendered young talent to get it. Instead of taking a low-risk chance on the best offensive player of the last 50 years, these teams gave up young talent to get players not nearly as good as Bonds.

No reason was ever given. At least no good reason was given. There was a pattern to the snubs.

Team A would lose an offensive player or have a glaring offensive weakness. Bonds's name would be floated one day, shot down the next.

"He's not someone we're considering," Astros GM Ed Wade said.

All these teams said basically the same thing: "Not someone we're considering. Sorry, not interested."

Why would this be? Is it because Barry Bonds is a jerk? Is it something more than that?

Are teams not signing Bonds because he used steroids? Isn't it a little late to be getting religious about steroids? Are we singling out Bonds when dozens and dozens of other players juiced?

The truth is that Barry symbolizes something baseball wants to go away. Baseball wants to get past the steroids era once and for all.

Bud Selig is the best commissioner baseball has ever had. By miles. He's been the key for the game's amazing growth.

But he'll also be remembered as the commissioner of the steroid era. Whether or not he was aware of what was happening, steroids happened on his watch, and he's going to have to accept that as part of his legacy.

Bonds and Roger Clemens symbolize one of his only failings as commissioner. He would love for them to go away.

In fairness, some of us in the media also allowed the steroid era to roll merrily along right in front of our eyes. We made heroes of players who grew large and hit moonshot home runs. We turned our heads.

This is where the story gets tricky. It's hard to believe that Selig would have telephoned teams to urge them not to sign Bonds. If he did, he's guilty of collusion and would be on the hook for tens of millions of dollars.

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The reality is likely much more subtle. Teams know how baseball management feels about Bonds and about the steroid era and the desire to get beyond the Mitchell Report.

Bonds probably would not be able to find a paper trail to prove that baseball has colluded to keep him out of the sport.

If he wants to build a case, he should subpoena an assortment of general managers, assistant general managers, managers and scouts. His lawyers should ask them if they wanted to sign Bonds at any point this season. They should ask them if Bonds could have helped them win. They should ask them if they believed Bonds would have torn the clubhouse apart.

Their answers might make Bonds' case. They too don't understand why Bonds wasn't signed. Yes, he would have made them better. No, he wouldn't have been a problem in the clubhouse.

Maybe there's a case. Maybe there isn't. Maybe it's all a big and amazing coincidence.

Then again, maybe this is how the baseball gods are getting back at Bonds. Maybe he's getting what he deserved.

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