'Chronicle' Reporters Detail Barry Bonds' Steroid Use in New Book

By: E&P Staff Two San Francisco Chronicle reporters, in an upcoming blockbuster book, detail how Barry Bonds began using steroids after the 1998 baseball season and came to rely on a wide variety of performance- enhancing drugs over the next several years.

The long-awaited book by Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams, who helped break the BALCO case, is excerpted in Sports Illustrated this week. They are also featured in a podcast at the newspaper's site today.

The book is titled, "Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal that Rocked Professional Sports," and is scheduled for publication March 27 by Gotham Books.

It book traces Bonds' steroid involvement to the off-season following the home-run race featuring pumped-up Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa in 1998.

The Chronicle's review of the excerpts observes, "Bonds decided to use performance-enhancing substances after watching McGwire -- whom the excerpt says he suspected was 'a juicer'-- gain national acclaim for eclipsing Roger Maris' storied single-season record."

Bonds has denied using performance-enhancing drugs. ?I've read what was reported,? Bonds' agent, Jeff Borris, told The Associated Press on Tuesday. ?Barry is looking forward to playing this year and the improved health of his knee, and being as productive as he's ever been.?

Phone messages left by the AP seeking comment from Bonds' attorney and publicist were not immediately returned Tuesday. Baseball did not ban performance-enhancing drugs until after the 2002 season.

The book excerpt, the Chronicle notes, "paints a sweeping picture of Bonds' thoughts about using steroids; the role of his weight trainer, Greg Anderson, in introducing him to specific drugs; how his choice of substances changed after he struggled with injuries and met Victor Conte, owner of the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative; and Bonds' reaction as his once-supple body turned thick and muscle-bound.

"Bonds is also portrayed as verbally abusive and profane to people around him, including Anderson, a childhood friend."

The excerpt says Fainaru-Wada and Williams based their narrative "on more than a thousand pages of documents and interviews with more than 200 people, many of whom we spoke to repeatedly."

According to the Chronicle, "The excerpt suggests Bonds was not truthful during his testimony before a federal grand jury in San Francisco on Dec. 4, 2003. Bonds testified that he used a clear substance and a cream supplied by BALCO, but he said he thought they were flaxseed oil and a rubbing balm for arthritis, The Chronicle previously reported. Bonds also flatly stated he never injected himself with drugs, according to a transcript of his testimony reviewed by the newspaper.

"The excerpt also says Bonds 'learned how to inject himself' and describes one conversation with Anderson in which Bonds says of starting another drug cycle, 'I'll do it myself.'"

There are other details, such as: Bonds repeatedly made racially tinged remarks about McGwire to Bell, at one point saying of his chase of the home run record, 'They're just letting him do it because he's a white boy.'"

More from the Chronicle summary:

--"Team management wondered what exactly he had done to so strikingly reshape his body, but the excerpt suggests owner Peter Magowan and other Giants officials 'had no interest in learning' whether he was using steroids."

--"Bonds also complained of pain in his knee and back, leading Anderson to search for other drugs in 2000. Soon thereafter, Anderson put Bonds on Deca-Durabolin, the excerpt says, and later added human growth hormone (HGH). Bonds favored HGH, according to the excerpt, because it allowed him to stay muscle-bound and maintain his thirst to train while also feeling flexible. It also seemed to improve his eyesight."

--"According to the excerpt, doping calendars ...also showed Bonds used testosterone; insulin, which had a significant anabolic effect when used with HGH; 'Mexican beans,' fast-acting steroids thought to quickly clear the user's system; trenbolone, a steroid 'created to improve the muscle quality of beef cattle'; and Clomid, a female fertility drug that Conte believed helped his clients 'recover their natural ability to produce testosterone.'"