Jeff Pearlman Isn't Christian.

Thank God sports journalists provide sports fans with common sense.

Sports journalism is a dignified profession. Without sports journalism, we would have never gotten "The mighty Casey had struck out" or George Plimpton's hilarious account of being an NFL kicker.

We might never have had our minds enlightened by the poetry and grace of the likes of Jeff Pearlman, this week's Captain of the Frothing At The Mouth Anti-Barry Bonds Mongoloid Army.

Here is the quote that defines Barry Bonds in the zeitgeist (as Pearlman wants it to believe):

Barry Bonds is an evil man. A truly evil man. As a husband, he has cheated on both his wives. As a father, he has been absent and indifferent. As a role model, he has spit at autograph seekers and directed kids to "f--- off." As a Giant, he has held a franchise hostage and refused to help teammates in need. As a blatant abuser of steroids and human growth hormone, he has deprived the game of integrity and turned its record books into mush. For all of those transgressions (and the 1,241,971 others I'm leaving out), Bonds deserves to reincarnate as Buddy Biancalana. In drag.

I don't know anything about Jeff Pearlman, nor do I care to learn. But I'd venture to guess that if I wrote something like that about him, he'd have his attorney on the phone. But Pearlman's brazen assault is motivated not because of his tremendously pathetic and strangely vociferous disaffection for #25, but for this reason and this reason alone:

When "Game of Shadows" first hit the bookstores, I was, uh, not happy. It was released three weeks before [Pearlman's own book] "Love Me, Hate Me," and soared to the top of the New York Times' Best Sellers list. Fainaru-Wada and Williams were my rivals, and they presented me an old-school thumping.

Pearlman goes on to write that Bonds should "come clean" and admit that he caused the housing bubble to burst, ate babies, and was responsible for 9/11 in order to prevent Bonds' buddy Anderson and the "Game of Shadows" authors from going to prison. But Pearlman could give a rat's ass about who goes to prison.

Really, Pearlman wants Bonds to do this so that he can finally do something "selfless and righteous." The only righteousness going on here, however, is Pearlman's self-righteousness. Not only because of his grandstanding and slanderous anti-Bonds article, but because the act of Bonds confessing would prove the central thesis of HIS BOOK:

In promoting "Love Me, Hate Me: Barry Bonds and the Making of an Antihero," I've done my best to paint the portrait of a conflicted, misunderstood character; of a man who isn't always what he seems and who -- beneath the layers of hostility -- possesses a decent dose of humility. Was I lying in such efforts? Not at all. I honestly believed that, despite the hundreds of former teammates and friends who relayed stories of Bonds' monstrous disposition, there was some good.

Calling out Bonds to get him to confess would bolster your shitty book's sales, you fucking Hacky McHackMaster. And make no mistake about it:

Barry Bonds would sooner be a Dodger than read what you've written, Jeff Pearlman.