Heard enough about steroids in baseball? Not yet, at least if you haven’t seen this week’s episode of HBO’s “Costas Now.”
It should be required viewing for any baseball fan and expertly dissects the game’s biggest problem.
This week when I spoke to Bob Costas about his show I asked what he hoped fans would take away.
“I hope people understand that this is a problem that we can’t over look or deny,” Costas said. “The steroid era ranks only behind the segregation era as one of baseball’s biggest problems.”
A roundtable discussion featuring Bob Gibson, Joe Morgan and Tim McCarver talked about this being “The Chemical Era.” The panel felt an asterisk should accompany any major record broken during this time.
However, they agreed if Barry Bonds breaks Hank Aaron’s career home run record, no asterisk is needed.
“The fans have an asterisk in their mind there is no need to put it in the record books,” McCarver said.
The show also includes an exclusive interview with Hall of Famer Willie Mays, Bonds’ godfather.
Costas: “Have you ever seen anybody as a contemporary, have you every seen anybody who you said, ‘That guy is as good or better than me?’”
Mays: “I can’t. You name one and I’ll tell you no. Just name one. Anybody.”
Costas: “Barry Bonds?”
Mays: “No. Barry couldn’t throw with me. He might not been able to run with me. Let’s give him hitting since he hit 73. Don’t think I can hit 73 home runs. I give him that. But, what else?”
Jim Williams is a seven-time Emmy Award-winning TV producer, director and writer.
