And it is fascinating to see the dogged support Conte continues to lend Bonds. And while he does continue to comment on the case, which may cause him to have some exposure, I think he senses there is little danger the Feds will see him as useful in any way to their cause, so he will not fall into the same problems Anderson has with them. We can again only speculate as to what his motives are for doing this. My cynical side thinks it may have something to do with his book:

http://www.amazon.com/BALCO-Straight-Steroids-Marion-Sports/dp/1602392951/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1234042607&sr=8-1

Which appears to be ready for impact here, and that if he keeps himself in the news he will get a chance from time to time to say, “Hey go read my book for the real story on this and what really happened”. I know I will be one who be making the purchase.

But there is likely to be a lot more to it than that, and to some extent I have to believe there would be a certain amount of Schadenfreude in it for him if the prosecution of Bonds blows up on the Feds and he is acquitted. While I can’t imagine it would make up for the turmoil it has caused in his life, there has to be part of him wanting to stick it to the Feds, especially to Novitsky for his unethical role in this investigation any way he can. It sounds like he will savage Novitsky in the new book, and I would imagine he will enjoy seeing him squirm on the stand when the defense team gets their crack at him.

I will also be interested to read what he thinks was the root cause of the investigation, because everything about this points to the man who patrolled left field and wore #25, and to see those efforts come to naught might take a bit of the sting out of things.

Strap in, as it is going to get really interesting over the next couple

Thanks for the effort.

I still want to discuss your thoughts on Conte. You said:

“Conte was fortunate enough to have Anderson as a buffer between himself and Bonds, so there was/is absolutely no reason to get himself dragged any deeper into this mess by claiming any knowledge of PED use by Bonds.”

But he still is getting in the middle. He is calling newspapers and reporters, and emailing them, all in an effort to make it clear that Bonds didn’t do steroids, and that the tests they have that supposedly “prove” that he did are essentially worthless. He has gone on the record many times saying that he never gave Bonds any drugs, that he never saw Bonds do drugs. He has done so at his own volition, over and over again. I find it fascinating.

You nailed it with Anderson, however. The full scope of his refusal to testify hinges on both his loyalty to Bonds, and –much more importantly– his own sense of fairness and trust of the government; whom he rightly believes will fuck him up the instant they have a chance to.

But I think CJ brings up a very good point about the motive of self-preservation in this in regard to Anderson that quite likely also applies to Conte’s actions at this time, which I neglected to mention in the original post. Conte was fortunate enough to have Anderson as a buffer between himself and Bonds, so there was/is absolutely no reason to get himself dragged any deeper into this mess by claiming any knowledge of PED use by Bonds. While we may disagree about whether omerta has been a successful tactic through time when everyone is sticking with the program, I think we can agree that there has been no honor in the way the Feds have conducted themselves during this process, and that Conte like Anderson has probably developed along with a strong dislike, an even stronger distrust of the “justice” department through their actions in this case. Thus making himself unattractive for further testimony in this case for the Feds makes some sense as well. I also imagine he wouldn’t mind seeing them come up with a big goose egg when this plays out.

When it comes down to it though we really don’t know, and may never know the reason(s) and where the actually truth in this matter rests. As I said in the original post I could be wrong in my thoughts in that I am not psychologist, I just like to play one on blogs and message boards from time to time, but the motives are likely to be multi-faceted for both men, and yet could be as simple as they are just telling the truth.

I completely agree with the other statements regarding the evidence being excluded in this case, and the hysteria and hypocrisy surrounding the proceedings. One thing that continues to disappoint me in all of this is how so many have rushed to judgment in this case without having all of the facts available to them. I continue to be, and have been from the beginning quite willing to wait on passing final judgment until they are all presented, and that may still be inconclusive.

And JP to your point on media hypocrisy, while I haven’t seen the interview yet, I have read in another forum Bob Costas interviewed one of the reporters who broke the A-Rod story in SI on MLB TV this morning, and was railing about A-Rod’s rights being violated by the leak as a union member and citizen of the United States. If that post was true reflection of his comments, you have entry #2,343,457 for the list of hypocrisy in the media, and while I am glad to see this if it is true, I’d say BC is a little late to the party.

Once again, keep up the good work, as I’ve been reading since the old blog days, and while I don’t post much as it would often be redundant, I will be checking in more as this case moves forward.

See pages 2 and 3 of their rebuttal to the govt’s response to their hearsay motion (pg. 9 and 10 of the pdf). The rebuttal is very thorough and well done and worth reading.

This evidence is not being excluded on a technicality, it’s being excluded because it is extremely unreliable.

There more here than meets the eye. The hypocritical, hysterical mass media –manipulated by the government– has controlled this story from the start. We still don’t know what really happened, even to this day.

“I’m not mad, I’m proud of you. You took your first pinch like a man and you learn two great things in your life. Look at me, never rat on your friends and always keep your mouth shut.”

If one believes the government that Bonds was knowingly ingesting steroids provided to him by BALCO through Greg Anderson, he could have very easily buried both Anderson and Conte in front of the grand jury with his testimony by just telling them the truth and then walked away without any legal issues facing him. If he didn’t take steroids, or he was unknowingly taking them, then he told the truth, but did no damage to either Conte or Anderson with his testimony in either scenario. While people can reasonably argue whether Bonds motivation for testifying the way he did was telling the truth, trying to protect his friend, trying to preserve his legacy, or some combination of those factors, the fact remains that Bonds grand jury testimony was pretty much worthless to the prosecution in achieving the eventual plea bargains brokered with Conte and Anderson.

In short, I think Conte like Anderson probably realizes that Barry could have given damaging testimony against both of them, but that he chose not to do so for whatever reason, and I think that is a large part why Conte continues to support him while throwing other former clients under the bus, like they did with him in front of the grand jury. Call it honor among thieves, friends taking care of friends, or people just telling the truth, I think there is loyalty and respect for Bonds support of him when he had the Feds coming down on him that on some level that motivates Conte to not to pile on Bonds as he fights for his freedom. I could be wrong, but that would be my best guess at your question as to why Conte defends Barry.

Keep up the good work.

“I think the tape is doctored. I don’t think they have the original tape. This is a guy (Hoskins) who betrayed his very best friend, for nothing,” said Canny. “So it’s completely in keeping that he would alter the tape.”

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/2009/02/05/2009-02-05_judge_might_toss_damning_evidence_agains.html

Of course the Rhoden article is correct. They should have never indicted Bonds without evidence, but by now they should just be satisfied with the damage they’ve inflicted on him and to my enjoyment of baseball – on our dimes.

all the defense needs to do is have conte testify how these samples were handled, and the judge must throw the evidence out

as for the tape…it is hearsay…its a joke

the big thing is the 2003 test

but i still cant believe that they are prosecuting a perjury charge…its a joke

btw, this case is nothing like the oj case

there, trained professionals messed up

here, these werent professionals…this was normal testing done on every athlete who used balco….it wasnt about chain of evidence