September 17, 2007
What Would You Do with Barry Bonds' Ball?
The dude who plunked down $752,467 to get the home-run ball that is #756 has decided to put it up to an online vote as to what to do with it. If you go to his site, www.vote756.com, you can vote for these three options:
-Send the ball to the Hall of Fame
-Send the ball to the Hall of Fame but not before branding it with a big, fat asterisk
-Blast it into outer space
Personally, we like the idea of blasting it into outer space in hopes that someday, some aliens will come upon it and think it's a message and so send a spaceship in response, one that mistakenly could destroy the planet Earth and so some futuristic starship captain will have to save the day, but not before nailing one of the aliens on the ship of course.
We also think there are some other possible options not considered, such as:
-Being adopted by Angelina Jolie
-New White House press spokesman
-Contestant on VH-1's "The Pick Up Artist" (let's see the pick-up experts try and get the ball laid)
-Next mysterious object on "Lost"
-Go into rehab with Lindsey Lohan
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All three of these options strike me as the publicity-whorings of douchebag par excellence.
Option 4: Throw it back onto the field.
Option 5: Allow it to be "stolen" so Bonds can participate in a "sting" to get it back, thereby landing himself in jail where he belongs....oh, nevermind, I had him mixed up with another super*star*
Yeah, it's worth mentioning that "the dude" is billionaire douchebag Mark Eckö. fuck him twice for making me look up how to type "o-gravé"
Right on #1. Dude says he wants to "democratize debate", but casting a vote for a pre-determined option is neither democracy nor debating.
Democracy is more than just voting, it's also about anyone being able to run for office - e.g. Chicken John.
Debate is what we're all doing already - arguing with our friends and fellow SFist commenters.
That said, I voted for #1. If we brand this ball, then we have to open up the cases and brand Mark McGwire's #62 and any other memorobilia that comes in from roughly 1990 to 2006.
It's too early to tell how history will judge the Steroids Era as a whole, let alone the accomplishments individual players who played during it.
The most important thing is to make sure that baseball (and sports in general) clean their acts up from now on. In a couple decades, we can go back and think about branding baseballs.
BRAND IT BABY (and then shoot it into space)