Twenty-five years from now, baseball’s disputed home-run king will walk onto the field at an All-Star Game. He’ll be pushing the all-time hit king, Pete Rose, who is in a wheelchair. The old-timers will wave to the crowd. Then, as they attempt to leave with dignity, an obnoxious television reporter will stick a microphone into their faces.

“Mr. Bonds, is it true you took steroids as a player? Mr. Rose, did you place bets on your own team when you were a player and manager? Is that why both of you still can’t get into the Hall of Fame?”

Barry Bonds and Rose never did like reporters much, let alone media ambushes, so they will answer as they always answered – evasively:

Bonds took something from his personal trainer during the years his muscles bulged like a comic-book hero, but he didn’t know what he was taking.

Rose owned up to betting on baseball in his 2004 autobiography “Pete Rose: My Prison Without Bars,” but it took him so long to confess, and he did it so self-servingly, he remains a liar in the eyes of many.

Rose’s tortured example ought to teach Bonds and other athletes embroiled in the current Balco steroids scandal that there’s only one way out, one way to save your good name and records: Come clean now.

Only a fool can believe that Bonds’ trainer didn’t give him steroids, that a mature man over 30 can build a massive body by merely lifting weights, that he played in a vacuum of purity when all around him athletes are confessing to using performance-enhancing drugs, getting caught by drug tests or fingered by steroid pushers.

To save himself from the fate of Pete Rose, Bonds ought to admit using steroids, apologize to fellow players and fans, and become a spokesman against the use of drugs in sports.

Unlike Rose, who was exposed after his playing career, Bonds is still active and at the top of his game. He can still hit enough home runs to surpass Henry Aaron’s record without the juice. We’ll never know how many of his homers were tainted. How many would have cleared the fence by an honest 10 feet instead of an artificially enhanced 20 feet?

What we do know is that Bonds was a genuine slugger, a most valuable player award winner during his early years. He didn’t hit all that many homers, relatively speaking, until his eighth season in the big leagues, but he was well on his way to a Hall of Fame career.

That brings up a curious question: Why do people with so much God-given talent resort to unnatural advantages when they don’t have to?

We might better understand steroid use in baseball’s minor leagues, where the temptation is greater for young players of lesser talent. That’s why the minor leagues have a stricter drug policy than the majors. But why would established stars like Bonds risk everything? Why would track star Marion Jones, who already was a world-class sprinter when she allegedly injected steroids before winning a remarkable five gold medals at the Sydney Olympics?

Jones probably will lose those medals because track-and-field officials don’t mess around. As for Bonds, Major League Baseball’s lax approach might save his records, but it will only tarnish his reputation and the integrity of the game.

At every game Bonds plays for the rest of his career, 10-year-olds will turn to their parents and ask why a cheater is allowed to play. After every home run, sportswriters and Hall of Fame voters will wonder – at least, the conscientious ones will.

At risk of sounding trite, what Bonds and other athletes tainted by the current steroid scandal need more than anything is forgiveness. But first they need to be honest with their sport, their fans and themselves. It might cost them records or a hefty fine or suspension, but trust is often built from the risk of telling the painful truth.

It will take a long time, but coming clean is the only way for fallen stars to rebuild their careers and save their good names. The alternative is a future of sad, old-timer gatherings and the same old questions and denials, right up to their obituaries.