The Zong

Barry Zito was at the Giants’ Fanfest last Saturday. I didn’t go, but by all accounts it was a heartening look at how press conferences will go with this particular Barry in a Gigantes uniform for years to come.

Saturday, with fans focusing on who was there instead of who wasn’t, they were given a chance to participate in question-and-answer sessions with players, and Zito’s was particularly educational. The first question came from a guy in the front row wearing an A’s jacket.

“What’s it going to be like to pitch to Huddy (Tim Hudson) and (Mark) Mulder?” asked the fan, referring to Zito’s old buddies in the Oakland rotation who now work in the National League.

Zito: “We’ve been talking smack about that ever since we came up. I’m visualizing getting knocks off Huddy.”

Other questions centered on Zito’s music career (he blew a chance to jam with Santana because he didn’t bring a guitar to Tony La Russa’s recent animal shelter benefit — “a bad decision”), his contract (”I know more is expected out of me, and I expect to elevate my game”) and his workload (”As a veteran guy, I’m expecting to go seven innings, if not eight or nine”).

While it’s pretty laughable to think of Barry Bonds fielding questions from fans, it’s possible that the Giants, through the just-got-out-of-bed good looks of Barry Zito, will somehow one day in the next few years be known as a younger, more fan-friendly team that pays talented players to play baseball without cheating.

That day may come sooner rather than later. In case you didn’t know, Barry Bonds actually isn’t signed yet. The media asked a lot of questions that the fans didn’t cover.

The Giants just finished their strangest Fan Fest ever, a Saturday full of “When are you signing Barry Bonds?” and “Are you signing Barry Bonds?” and “What’s up with Barry Bonds?” questions hanging in the air, unharmed by as much as a single answer. Indeed, the Bonds contract issue has been downgraded by someone in a position to know as “a coin-flip.”

I think that this is good news, although I will definitely freak out when I see Pedro Feliz batting fourth on Opening Day. If Bonds is healthy, can still hit, and plays more than 3 times a week, I guess the Giants will be better off lineup-wise this year if they sign him. But if Magowan and Co. really want to demonstrate that they’ve had enough and really want to take the New Way Forward, they’ll tell Bonds to go pound sand.

I watched Barry play when I was still a kid, and I remember worshiping him through some of the thinnest years in San Francisco Giants history. It’s fair to say that he helped save this franchise from obscurity and even helped to build a great ballpark that will only add to the Giants’ legacy here, but doesn’t that make it even more despicable that he has single-handedly taken a wrecking ball to all of it with the last three years of bullshit?

Even in San Francisco, the fans’ patience is wearing thin.

“It’s like a bad relationship,” Gregory Imura, 27, said. “You kind of ride it out and hope the good times you had will come back again when he leaves.

I suppose I agree with that. All those good times are hard to remember with all those lawyers around.

- M.G.