While Buster Olney busts a guy over Gene Orza claiming “in my 22 years I’ve known Barry Bonds he has never blamed anyone for anything,” (“There may be other more amusing statements made in 2007, but this has a chance to be the runaway laughable line of the year.”), the Boston Globe’s Nick Cafardo collects a bunch of anonymous quotes, all designed to bury the sweet, deeply misunderstood Sultan.

“Nothing like dragging your teammate down and throwing him under the bus,” said one veteran American League player. “That, to me, is despicable.”

One baseball official offered a twofold take on it.

“I think those people who have been on the fence concerning Bonds’s potential steroids use will now begin to move against him,” he said. “I don’t think he made any friends or won over any new supporters over this. Implicating a teammate, even though he apologized, will only make Mark Sweeney more endearing to the public while Bonds will take another hit. It smacks of a kindergarten beef where the boy is caught with mud on his shoes and blames it on Johnny.

The second issue, according to the official: “It gives the Giants even more leverage in their negotiations with Bonds. He’s now tested positive for amphetamines. He’s implicated a teammate. And so now the Giants, who have been trying to seek all sorts of protections in the deal in case Barry Bonds is indicted, I’m sure will have all the leverage in getting what they want in the contract.”

Officials of a few teams told me they’re hoping and praying that Bonds doesn’t hit his record-breaking homer at their ballparks next season. The Giants come to Boston for a three-game series June 15-17, but he needs 22 homers to pass Hank Aaron, and that would seem too soon, though not out of the question.

The Giants are also visiting Milwaukee June 18-20 and July 20-22. If Barry is in a position to pass Aaron during either series, I’m sure Brewers ownership will be so conflicted over selling out Miller Park on the back of such a dubious achievment, they’ll donate the entire box office take to charity.

Besides penning a love letter to crushes as diverse as Barbara Boxer, David Lee and Jack Bauer, the New York Daily News’ Mike Lupica raises the question of Roger Clemens’ “crackerjack training regimen,” adding the cavaet,

Profiling of any kind in any area of life is always a risky business, and sometimes a dangerous one. No one is saying that Roger Clemens is guilty just because he fits the performance-enhancing profile.

Nope. You’re just implying he’s guilty, without doing a shred of research besides repeating points that have been made elsewhere, time and time again.

Inspired by the nearly successful campaign to send Rory Fitzpatrick to the NHL All-Star Game, Metsradamus has a similar scheme in mind for the Mets’ Endy Chavez.

Certainly in a world where Bobby Bonilla can receive two votes for baseball’s Hall of Fame, we can muster up enough votes to get Endy Chavez into 2007’s All Star game, right? So I say, let’s not give MLB the chance to change their minds. I say go forth and vote Endy Chavez to the All-Star game in San Francisco…the home of Barry Bonds I might add…and make sure that Chavez is playing left field instead of Bonds. Stop baseball royalty and reward the little guy. Reward the perseverance. Reward the catch. And let’s piss off the baseball establishment together.