CORRECTION: Baseball-Bonds shrugs off Selig conundrum

(Corrects name of Bonds’s brother to Bobby Bonds Jr. in ninth para)

By Larry Fine

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Barry Bonds simply shrugged when asked about one of the season's hot topics -- whether Major League commissioner Bud Selig should be in attendance if the Giants slugger surpasses Hank Aaron as home run king.

"Bud's his own man," Bonds told reporters in the visitors' dugout before Wednesday's game against the New York Mets. "I'm my own man."

And Hank Aaron is his own man.

Aaron has made it clear he would not be there for the big moment for Bonds, widely suspected of having used performance-enhancing drugs to boost his power.

The 42-year-old Bonds is within nine homers of the record after ending a lengthy drought with his 12th of the season on Sunday to bring his career total to 746.

"I'm not going to fly to go see somebody hit a home run, no matter whether it's Barry or Babe Ruth or Lou Gehrig or whoever it may be. I'm not going anyplace," Aaron has told reporters.

Selig, a good friend of Aaron's, is torn between marking the moment and snubbing the man who has been a key grand jury witness in the BALCO investigation.

Bonds's brother also joined the discussion about Selig's conundrum.

Bobby Bonds Jr. told the New Jersey Star-Ledger on Wednesday that his brother deserved better treatment.

"Especially Hank Aaron," Bobby Bonds said. "Hank Aaron does not even want to support Barry. Being a black man going through what he went through in the past and not supporting my brother, it kind of makes me look at him like, 'Are you serious, brother? Are you serious?'"

Bobby Bonds, who said he does not believe his older brother took steroids, also thinks Selig should mark the moment.

"Cut the steroids out, just look at my brother as a human being," Bonds Jr. said. "It's so hard to justify what's going on with baseball and how they're treating him."

Barry Bonds has not spoken to Aaron.

"I've never spoken personally to Hank Aaron," he said. "I don't have a problem about Hank Aaron. He's well respected by all of us. We all love him and admire him and I'll leave it at that."

Bonds, adored at his home park in San Francisco and jeered on the road, was asked about the chorus of boos he received at Shea Stadium.

"It was like a concert," Bonds said.