When Major League Baseball Steroid King Barry Bonds hits town for his only visit of the season next Friday, there's a just-a-bit-outside chance he could pass Babe Ruth for second on the all-time home-run list before he leaves. This, readers, is the justification I opted to employ when a college friend called the other day asking if I could give his new book about Bonds a shout-out.

Now, I haven't read it cover-to-cover yet; it sat on the coffee table most of the weekend since I finally caved in and did some lawn work. But, from what I know of Jeff Pearlman—he was the boss of me at the University of Delaware Review back in the early '90s when we'd often get called to the dean of students' office for talkings-to— Love Me, Hate Me: Barry Bonds and the Making of an Antihero (HarperCollins) deserves the buzz that had him waiting to give his 40th radio interview of the past week when we caught up via cell phone Monday.

Some background for sports haters: Bonds, MLB's reigning slugger, passed the single-season record by slugging 73 homers a few seasons back. (A big deal.) This season, should his crumbling body hold up, he could make a run at Hank Aaron's all-time career record. (A very big deal.)

He's also a blatant cheater.

And a royal prick.

The latter two explain why I'm not surprised Pearlman, over the past two years, interviewed 524 people to write this comprehensive biography. If I learned one thing from Pearlman, it's to embrace controversy. (His 1999 Sports Illustrated story exposed Atlanta Braves relief pitcher John Rocker as a bumbling bigot.)

So, rather than hitting the standard steroid questions, I wanted to test the theory—which I believe—that Bonds juiced up so he could 1) break Mark McGwire's single-season record because it was held by a white man and 2) hit more career home runs than Ruth, because of the Babe's pigmentation.

Race, Pearlman found, is a big theme in Bonds' personal and professional development; Bonds watched his baseball-playing father (Bobby) and godfather (Willie Mays) sit on the receiving end of vile, racist taunts from fans. That, and being called "Blackberry" in the Caucasian-dominated schools he grew up attending, instilled a "mistrust in white authority."

Details like these explain why Bonds, whom I once respected for not taking any shit from anyone, would say the city of Boston is "too racist" for him to play in, and mistakenly maintain that cities don't "build stuff for blacks," meaning statues and monuments. Pearlman noted the irony that should Bonds top Aaron's 755 home runs, "he'll be breaking records by cheating when the guy he's topping, the one he says he respects, went through so much venom" on his way to legendary achievement.

As a white dude from the Jersey 'burbs, I don't know what it feels like on racism's receiving end. But I can say this: The discrimination chip on Bonds' shoulder is misplaced. If he's truly trying to stake an African-American claim atop the record book of America's pastime, cheating to top the pioneers who paved his way to fame is insulting.

That's not to say there isn't racism in sports. But as much as Bonds might expect it, it won't rear its ugly head if he heads to the Citizens Bank Park plate with a chance to relegate Ruth to third. When I got to thinking about Bonds, the Phillies' racist history and modern-day discrimination, I was watching soccer matches from Spain and England (instead of the Flyers' playoff game, since Comcast, in its finite wisdom, considers East Falls a neighborhood non grata.) It came as a shock when the commentator started talking about how teams at the World Cup in Germany this June could be penalized for their fans' racist behavior.

After the disgust subsided, I started wishing Barry was there. I wanted to say, "You think you got it bad? Try being a black player in Spain who tries to focus on the game while hearing, according to the BBC, 'monkey chants' spewed in his direction. Or the fan of an African World Cup qualifier who will receive a list of places in which they'd likely to be targeted for violence."

Of course, considering Bonds' apparent disdain for his fellow man, which Pearlman painstakingly details, he'd probably blow it off. But when the human growth hormones start taking a premature toll on his body, hopefully Bonds will realize people didn't hate him because he was black.

They hate him because he hates everybody … except himself.