King Kaufman's Sports Daily

Chemistry Experiment 3: The Giants are happy and loose without Barry. Will that mean anything? Plus: ESPN's soap opera.

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March 7, 2008 | The San Francisco Giants, fresh from the long winter of Barry Bonds' discontent and enjoying an invigorating spring of freedom and equality, are fertile ground for a chemistry experiment.

Much has been made of new center fielder Aaron Rowand's weekly team-building bowling outings and Barry Zito's move into Bonds' old suite of four lockers in the spring training clubhouse, parceling it up with Matt Cain.

The players and manager Bruce Bochy are talking about how they're a team now, with no more of the old double standard, about how they'll have fun together off the field and scratch and claw together on it, manufacturing runs and swaggering with warrior spirit, as noted on the matchy-matchy T-shirts they've been wearing.

"One can debate the value of team chemistry from now until the Tampa Bay Rays' first World Series victory parade," wrote the San Francisco Chronicle's Henry Schulman, who endured years of Bonds' scorn on the Giants beat. "There is no question that talent and execution are more important, and the Giants have much room to improve on both counts after a 71-91 season.

"Even so, a reporter who visited the home clubhouse at Fenway Park when the Giants played in Boston in June was struck by the jocularity and fellowship inside a room populated by youngsters and superstars who together won a World Series four months later. It was a stark contrast to the way the Giants tiptoed through Bonds' clubhouse."

Another stark contrast, though clearly one not lost on Schulman: the talent on the field that had led the Red Sox to 96 wins and the Giants to 71. If the Giants had had Manny Ramirez and Mike Lowell and Dustin Pedroia tiptoeing around Bonds' suite of lockers rather than Dave Roberts, Pedro Feliz and Ray Durham, that would have goosed the number in the win total a lot more than weekly bowling night.

At least I think so. Not everybody does, and thus, the experiment.

Bonds, under federal indictment for perjury, remains unsigned, and Phil Taylor writes in the current Sports Illustrated, "Any team that does develop a serious interest in Bonds would be wise to consider all the good vibrations coming out of the Giants' camp now that he's gone. It's hard to imagine that Bonds' presence could do more for a new club than his absence has done for his old one."

Next page: The right result from this experiment could have a positive effect on Salon. Plus: ESPN gets sudsy