Bonds’ Surgeon Is on Probation

Barry Bonds’ three recent knee operations were performed by a doctor who has a history of troubles with state medical authorities.

Dr. Arthur J. Ting has been reprimanded twice by the Medical Board of California, and now is on probation for unprofessional conduct, the Arizona Republic reported.

Ting completed his first probation in 1998. According to the newspaper, Ting was put on five years’ probation on April 5, 2004, because of a second incident of unprofessional conduct.

According to documents obtained by the Republic, a complaint to the medical board in May 2003 alleged that Ting employed an unlicensed technician who saw patients and wrote prescriptions. Many patients believed the technician was a doctor.

The complaint also accused Ting of prescribing “dangerous drugs and controlled substances to friends and acquaintances, particularly athletes, for whom he kept no medical records or for whom the medical records were fictitious, inadequate or inaccurate.”

*

Former pitcher Tom House said he misspoke when he estimated a half-dozen pitchers on every team experimented with steroids or human growth hormone in the 1960s and 1970s.

House said he meant to say those players used amphetamines.

“It was my fault. Maybe I wasn’t saying what I thought I was saying,” he told Associated Press, referring to the interview that appeared in Tuesday’s San Francisco Chronicle.

*

Two Boston Red Sox fans who scuffled with New York Yankee outfielder Gary Sheffield during a game last month won’t be charged after a court dismissed the case for lack of evidence.

The clerk magistrate said there was no probable cause to charge Christopher House and Matthew Donovan with misdemeanor disorderly conduct.

House and Donovan were ejected from Fenway Park on April 14 after House appeared to make contact with Sheffield as the right fielder was chasing a ball.

*

St. Louis activated left-hander Bill Pulsipher from the 15-day disabled list and recalled right-hander Brad Thompson from triple-A Memphis. They replace left-hander Carmen Cali and right-hander Jimmy Journell, who were sent to Memphis.... Jim Thome was diagnosed with a strained lower back, and Philadelphia hopes its first baseman will be able to play again in two weeks.