Greg Anderson has become a hero and role model for those who can appreciate a real man. Unlike some others who are acting more like a cry baby by asking "what's in it for me?"
On the Mark: The man behind 756
Mark Kriegel
FOXSports.com
July 31, 2006
With Barry Bonds poised to set the new home run record, you might want to take a moment to acknowledge the man who made it possible.
I'm talking about the musclehead most often seen in video clips, the guy wearing an ill-fitting suit on his way to court.
I'm talking about Greg Anderson.
Who'd have thought he would stand up like this?
Certainly not the United States government.
You don't have to like Bonds, a cheater, or Anderson, a convicted steroids dealer. You are well advised to disregard the denials of Anderson's attorney, and wonder what rewards await him when he finally gets out of jail. (You may also wonder why, if Bonds is such a sport, Anderson doesn't have much to his name after the years he already spent toiling for the surly outfielder.) Still, a lot of guys have turned on their friends and employers for a lot less. At this point, Anderson, making 12 cents an hour in a prison kitchen, deserves a little respect.
Though "the Bonds grand jury" isn't expected to reconvene until September, Greg Anderson remains in jail for refusing to testify.
The government has made an industry of confessing felons. I thought something was a little off last week when the word came that NBA ref Tim Donaghy might be connected to the Gambino crime family. Gambino crime family? At this point there are more recovering wiseguys in the Witness Protection Program (not to mention those trying to get work as actors) than there are actual gangsters. Of course, you don't have to be a gangster to roll over on your friends and associates. Politicians do it. Ballplayers do it. Even reporters do it. Everybody gives up everybody. It's an unfortunate aspect of our culture.
By my count, the Michael Vick dogfighting conspiracy case now has five cooperating witnesses. The most recent of them is Tony Taylor, one of Vick's co-defendants until he pleaded guilty on Monday and agreed to testify against the quarterback. You weren't surprised, were you? Vick could have taken care of him, too. But faced with prison time, some guys need less incentive than others.
One assumes that prosecutors thought Anderson would turn pretty easy. These obsessive weight-lifter types are often vulnerable people. Anderson — who once set up a company called Get Big Productions — would certainly qualify. He was 10 when his father was killed over a dispute at a card game (recommended reading on this subject, as with all Bonds-related matters, is Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams' Game of Shadows). Anderson loved baseball, but wasn't nearly good enough to make a living at the game. Instead, he became a trainer and self-styled steroid expert, eventually reconnecting with Bonds, whom he had known and admired as a Little Leaguer in California. Working with Bonds did more than get Anderson back in the game. It afforded him, as Fainaru-Wada and Williams write, "an opportunity to play an important role in molding him into the greatest player who ever lived."
Now inmate No. 93389-011 works in the kitchen at Dublin Federal Correctional Institution. He's done his time on the BALCO case, three months in jail (Victor Conte, the president and founder of BALCO, only did four) and another three months of house arrest after pleading guilty to steroid distribution and money laundering. He pleaded only after turning down the government's offer of probation in return for his testimony against Bonds.
Still, the government wasn't satisfied. Prosecutors wanted his testimony for what is now known as "the Bonds grand jury," a judicial body that feels as if it's been meeting longer than the Whitewater grand jury. When Anderson refused, Judge William Alsup sent him to jail. That was November. According to the Associated Press, Alsup denied Anderson's request for a "brief furlough" that would have allowed him to spend Christmas with his eight-year-old son.
Though the grand jury took July off and isn't expected to reconvene until September, Anderson remains in jail.
I dislike Bonds, but I have to ask, is that fair? Is this what the government should be doing?
It could be another six months before Anderson is free. It could be more. Who knows? When this is finally over, Anderson might have done more time than Sammy Gravano. The government gave Gravano a pass on 19 bodies in return for his testimony against John Gotti.
But that was the good old days, when there really was a Gambino crime family. Now it turns out that Greg Anderson is more of a stand-up guy than all those federally subsidized rats living in Arizona.
People wonder how Barry Bonds is holding up these days.
The real question is, how did Anderson hold up?
