Giambi

If you were looking for a perfect postscript to this strange Orioles season, maybe it was the moonshot that landed on Eutaw Street in the first inning of the last home game at Camden Yards this year. Jason Giambi, who held a news conference in February to deliver a non-specific apology to Yankees fans for his alleged involvement in the BALCO steroid scandal, launched a towering three-run shot off Erik Bedard and got an enthusiastic ovation from the pro-pinstripe crowd that has long since forgiven him for whatever it was he did that required forgiveness.

Greeting cards are lined up along the shelves in Sam Perlozzo's office, friends and former colleagues expressing their joy in verse after he was named Orioles interim manager last month. Not one of them offers condolences. Those sentiments will come if Perlozzo loses his job. Considering how the Orioles are playing, he might be pitied more if he keeps it. The New York Yankees scored six runs in the fourth inning last night, half of them coming on Jason Giambi's homer, and they batted around twice while taking over sole possession of first place in the American League East with an 11-3 victory over the Orioles before an announced crowd of 43,039 at Camden Yards.

BATTING LINE OF THE DAY Chris Snyder, D'backs C AB R H RBI HR 5 2 3 5 2 PITCHING LINE OF THE DAY Chris Capuano, Brewers IP H R BB SO 8 2 1 2 3 WHO'S HOT Jason Giambi hit a major league-best 14 homers in July, the most in a month by a Yankee since Mickey Mantle hit 14 in July 1961. WHO'S NOT, The Twins, who lost their fourth consecutive game, were swept for the third time this season; they were swept just twice last year.

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. - In piqued contrast to Jason Giambi's apologetic sheepishness of two weeks ago, Barry Bonds ran pretty much the gamut from mildly surly to decidedly surly yesterday in his welcome-back news conference. Irked by the 100 or so reporters assembled at the San Francisco Giants' spring training complex, Bonds rambled through turns as media critic, sociologist, sports historian, fervent proponent of strict drug-testing policies, even baseball player. The list did not include apologist.

NEW YORK - In one of the most unusual news conferences in New York Yankees history, Jason Giambi broke his silence yesterday, but he didn't say much ... including the word "steroids." Making his first public appearance since it was revealed in the San Francisco Chronicle late last year that he admitted to a federal grand jury he took steroids for three seasons, Giambi opened by apologizing to fans, teammates and the Yankees' organization. But when pressed to explain what he was sorry for, Giambi repeatedly said he was advised not to go into detail, citing his "ongoing legal matters."

THE QUESTIONS ARE fairly simple. Chances are, the answers aren't as simple as they'd seem. Or, they might be painfully simple. Elite athletes are asked similar questions every few years: Would they take a substance, legal or not, that would guarantee them a gold medal but would significantly shorten their life spans? An overwhelming majority answer "yes." So, are fans as willing to go to the same lengths to see their favorite players, teams and performers win? From the outrage being expressed in the past few days about Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi, Victor Conte and Marion Jones, the answer is an emphatic "no."

New York Yankees slugger Jason Giambi became the new face of baseball's steroid scandal yesterday, when a published report revealed his admission, in grand jury testimony, that he took steroids provided by the personal trainer of San Francisco Giants star Barry Bonds. Giambi, 33, had publicly denied using steroids, but the San Francisco Chronicle obtained his testimony in the federal inquiry in the BALCO labs case from December 2003, in which he describes using a syringe to inject human growth hormone into his stomach and testosterone into his buttocks.

When the Yankees' Jason Giambi blossomed from a good hitter of average build into a slugger with a thick neck, bulging arms and a steel torso, it thrilled fans and made him one of the top commodores in Major League Baseball. But doctors who observed the rapid transformation of Giambi and many other athletes weren't surprised by yesterday's disclosure that the Yanks' first baseman had turned to performance-enhancing drugs. Such changes, they said, do not occur in nature, even among athletes who train hard and eat properly.

BANISHED, EXPELLED. And, by the way, Jason Giambi: That $120 million contract you pumped yourself full of steroids to secure? It's now null and void. That's what the commissioner of baseball ought to declare for the Yankees' steroid-slugging slugger. Sorry, son. Hope your pituitary tumor gets better. Health is far more important than home runs, especially if the homers came courtesy of human growth hormone and other forms of muscle-popping, body-damaging steroids. Needles in the buttocks, cream on the legs, drops on the tongue: It's a wonder Giambi doesn't have mysterious appendages where there shouldn't be appendages.

NEW YORK - John Olerud underwent a magnetic resonance imaging exam on his left foot yesterday, and New York Yankees manager Joe Torre said the first baseman injured in Game 3 wouldn't be available for the rest of the American League Championship Series, and that his availability for the World Series was in doubt. "We'll have to wait for the results (of the MRI)," Torre said. Torre has said he will not put Jason Giambi on the playoff roster, even with Olerud injured. Giambi went 4-for-33 after returning from a long absence with a benign tumor, and he's still not strong enough to play regularly.