If you grew up in the 60s and 70s, you remember the classic MAD magazine cartoonist Dave Berg, who drew that square, pipe-smoking father character. One memorable strip went like this: Teenaged boys are making lots of noise in the next room, and wifey complains to husband. Square Dad goes into his kid’s room to discover the boys are indulging in loud sexual braggadocio. He intones: “Fellas, I’ve been around long enough to know that the more a guy talks about it, the less he does it.” Last frame: Wifey to husband, who has smug smile: “How on earth did you get them to quiet down so quickly?”

I was reminded of this parable when I read the story in the Chronicle yesterday: Bonds’ agent says he’s getting lots of offers.

Bonds, who became a free agent on Nov. 1, is apparently for sale to the highest bidder, though mlb.com assures us, “Bonds and the Giants are staying in contact.” (And isn’t that nice? He gave them his real phone number, not 800-BUH-BYEE.) Bonds’ agent:

“There’s interest outside of San Francisco,” said Jeff Borris, not revealing specifics. “There are teams that don’t characteristically sign free-agent players such as Barry that called and said they were interested. I was a little surprised. But how could you blame them? Barry has a chance to break the home run record in their ballpark.”

The agent coyly refused to name the exact number of interested teams, but something tells me he was holding up a lot of fingers, and was taking off his socks as the Chronicle reporter hung up.

You know, if there was really that much interest in Barry, the agent wouldn’t have to brag about it to the Chronicle. All he’d have to do is sit back in his chair and watch the lights on his phone go blink-blink-blink with all those GMs on hold.

Barry Bonds reminds me of the character The Mimic in the old X-Men comics. Though the most powerful of the X-Men, he was always a pain in the ass to everyone, alternately bragging and showing off and taking care to call Prof. Xavier names like “chrome-dome.” He was Goofus to the other X-Men’s Gallant. And yes, he helped them out of plenty of jams. But nobody liked him.