AJC > Sports > Braves > Blog > Archives > 2007 > July > 13
Friday, July 13, 2007
Interviewing Bonds has never been a treat
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It’s Friday the 13th. I haven’t blogged in ages. It seems like the Braves haven’t played in ages. So what’s on my mind today?
Barry Bonds.
Sorry, I know you’ve been slammed with stuff about him over the All-Star break, all the feel good, feel bad, dang Hank’s record is really going to fall stuff. But I thought now might be a good time to share my own brush with infamy story, one I never really thought I would tell.
When I first told an old editor about this, she said, “Why didn’t you write it?” Well, that wasn’t my style, I explained. But hey, that was before we had this wonderful new forum called a blog, before BALCO and before, I don’t know, the statute of my limitations on the subject ran out.
And it’s not like Barry has done any of us media types any favors. Last time I asked him a question, during spring training, his response was “I’ve done that interview 21 times and I’m not doing it today.”
So there. And so here goes.
I was a young and somewhat terrified reporter for the Macon Telegraph at the time, 10 summers ago, when I was assigned to go write a sidebar about Barry Bonds when the Giants were in town.
Now he had supposedly gotten a little media friendlier, but I never kidded myself this interview would be a picnic. It was already a little bit hard for me to go in visiting clubhouses anyway, as a woman, since opposing teams weren’t really expecting me or used to me being around. It just meant I had to take a little bit deeper breath before I walked through the door.
So I did and went to look for Bonds. Didn’t see him, didn’t see him, didn’t see him. I’d go back to the clubhouse, wait for a few minutes, then leave, not wanting to be a fixture there. I’d done this probably three times, when I decided during batting practice to give it one last swing by. I walked into the visiting clubhouse at Turner Field and heard music blaring. I walked around the corner to see nobody in the room except Barry Bonds. He was sitting on a couch on the opposite side of the room, head in a magazine, bobbing to the music.
You talk about a deep breath.
“OK,” I thought. “Here I go.”
I walked all the way around the couch and came up behind him. He never looked up. I reached out and tapped him on the shoulder. I got most of the words out “Barry, do you have a minute?” when I looked over his shoulder and saw something I never really ever need to see.
Let’s just say he was reading a magazine that doesn’t require much reading. I froze. It was way too late for me to take my tap-on-the-shoulder back, throw it in reverse and disappear.
“No, I’m busy right now,” Bonds said, managing to increase my angst.
So I’m standing there, face flushed, brain spinning, trying to figure out the next thing you’re supposed to say in a situation like that, and he spoke again.
“You know what? Yeah, yeah I do have a minute,” and he put the magazine down and moved over on the couch.
So I walked around and sat down, all excited and nervous then, and I started firing off my questions. I had planned quite a few of them - preparation helps take the nerves away for me. And he proceeded to deflect every question I asked.
“That’s luck,” or “I’m not really sure,” or “Blahty blah.”
It wasn’t mean-spirited. It seemed more like a game to him.
Not really sure what to say, I finally just kinda threw up my hands and said “Well, I’m just not asking very good questions, am I?”
He said “Yes you are, I’m just not answering them.”
And we laughed.
Hey, at least I knew I was doing everything I could possibly do to get that story, and it just wasn’t happening. So we chatted for a few minutes more, in an amicable way, and I left. I called my editor and told him I didn’t get enough to write anything. I don’t think I’d ever done that before, but at that time, it was what I felt I had to do.
I wasn’t about to write about Barry Bonds and a porno mag. I was supposed to respect the fact that baseball players let me into their fraternity house and I wasn’t going to blow that all up because a player had made me mad by not talking. Or at least not saying anything I could write. For one thing, I didn’t want other players to read that and think I could not be trusted.
I still feel that way. But I guess the blog has broken me down, and the fact that Barry Bonds isn’t exactly a charter member of the fraternity anymore, or so it seems to me. And it’s not a bad story, is it? I’ve told it at cocktail parties. Might as well tell it here.
So that’s it. Maybe you guys would have a better punch line for it.
And oh yeah, this is supposed to be a Braves blog. and I can’t twist Bonds into much of a Braves angle that DOB hasn’t already done. He’s already put the fear into everybody’s hearts of “oh no, what if Bonds breaks Hank Aaron’s record against Atlanta. Or even in Atlanta, no less?”
Dave’s also done a nice and complete job of wrapping up the first half of the Braves season. So I’ll just say hey, Pirates are in town tonight. Let’s get rolling.
The Braves get to play their next 14 games against teams with sub .500 records - Pirates, Reds, Cardinals, and yes, the Giants. Maybe the Braves will make a move back to the top of the NL East.
So bring it on, second half. About time you got here.
