After making an appearance during both the NLCS and the first the game of the World Series, former San Francisco Giants star Barry Bonds confirmed his desire to return to the team in an instructional capacity. Bonds expressed an interest in returning to the team as its hitting coach, stating, "I have a gift and sooner or later I have to give it away...I have to share it. Hopefully I'll get the opportunity [in San Francisco]." The left-handed slugger spent his final 15 seasons in the city by the bay, garnering four NL MVP awards and setting the single-season home run record with 73 four-baggers in 2001.

Though he was noted in the Mitchell Report, Bonds has never admitted to knowingly using steroids. The same cannot be said for Mark McGwire, the former St. Louis Cardinal whose 70 home runs in 1998 stood as the record for just two short years before Bonds surpassed him. Beyond their mutual association with the steroid discussion, the two are also connected by their recent forays - attempted or realized - into the field of coaching. 

McGwire just completed his first season as the Cardinals' hitting coach. While the St. Louis offense did not improve appreciably (the team hit a collective .263 with an on base percentage of .332 in both 2009 and 2010 and slugged 13 points lower from 2009 to 2010), the Cardinals experienced relative gains, rising 14th to ninth and 18th to 12th in all of baseball in batting average and on base percentage, respectively. Though one season is far too small a sample to laud or lambaste McGwire's performance as a coach, the Cardinals thought highly enough of it to retain him for another season.

Implicit in this discussion of their legitimacy as coaches is the effect steroids have on a professional baseball player, specifically a position player and hitter. Although many have argued that steroids made these players' careers - and thus tarnished the credentials they would rely on to secure these positions - the truth is not that simple. Steroids, in combination with a rigorous exercise regimen, can and do enable the user to gain more strength more rapidly than someone who abstains from their use. 

What steroids do not do is increase one's ability to hit a baseball. The act of hitting a baseball traveling in excess of 90 miles-per-hour is arguably the single most difficult task in sports and requires elite-level hand-eye coordination in addition to the benefits that added size and strength would provide. Barry Bonds, owner of a picture-perfect swing, did not come to possess that talent through the use of steroids - he did so by training extremely hard to maximize on the unique gifts he was given.

Thus, while McGwire and Bonds both undoubtedly (admittedly and allegedly) benefited from steroid usage, it is safe to say that both know a thing or two about hitting and have valuable insight on the subject that they can and should, if they so desire, impart to the game's up and coming talent. Obviously each team is free to assemble its coaching staff as it sees fit. If they choose to go in a different direction based on merit, they are welcome to do so. But to make a decision based on either player's association with steroids would be a mistake. McGwire was able to return and fade into his role without serving as a distraction, and perhaps Bonds could do so as well. The Giants' pitching has carried the team for much of the year, and to say definitively that Bonds could not help that team because of an allegedly checkered past would be short-sighted. 

The only person trumpeting that perspective might be this man.