These are not the Giants of Willie Mays and Barry Bonds

Barry Bonds last played here three years ago. The San Francisco Giants have scrubbed their ballpark fairly thoroughly since then, and their roster too.

The Giants honor Bonds as the all-time home run leader with a small outfield sign, dwarfed by advertisements for Comcast and Bank of America. They commemorate him in small letters — along with Willie Mays, Willie McCovey and Mel Ott — for hitting 500 homers for the franchise.

The Giants sell Mays T-shirts and game-worn Kevin Frandsen jerseys in the team store, but they do not sell Bonds gear there, since Bonds controls his merchandise.

And, of the position players on the last roster to include Bonds, the only one to survive three more years and earn a spot on the World Series roster is reserve outfielder Nate Schierholtz.

“Am I?” Schierholtz said. “Wow.”

As the World Series opens here Wednesday, with the Giants trying to vanquish the Texas Rangers and deliver the championship to San Francisco that Mays and Bonds could not, the Giants have remade their roster and their image.

“In some ways, it almost happened overnight,” General Manager Brian Sabean said. “In some ways, we’ve still got a lot of work to do.”

The roster reconstruction has not gone entirely according to plan, but the Giants have shrugged off their mistakes and plowed ahead.

The ownership spent $126 million on Barry Zito and introduced him as the face of the Giants for the post-Bonds era. Zito did not make the playoff rotation.

The Giants spent $60 million on center fielder Aaron Rowand and introduced him as a big bat. He was beaten out this season by Andres Torres, signed as a minor league free agent.

“It’s a minefield — with us or any other organization,” Sabean said. “You really can’t be all that upset. There’s so much to live up to with a new contract, or the signing of a contract.

“In this case, we’ve been able to survive it. We were able to balance the team and balance the books.”

The Giants kept plugging holes, if only because they kept creating them. Of the eight position players to start behind Tim Lincecum on opening day, no more than four will be in the lineup behind him in Game 1 of the Series.

They needed a first baseman last winter, but they were spurned by Nick Johnson and Adam LaRoche. They signed their third choice, Aubrey Huff, who had no other offers, and he emerged as the No. 3 batter in the lineup.

They needed a left fielder, so they signed Mark DeRosa. He got injured, so they signed Pat Burrell to a minor league contract in May, and he emerged as the No. 5 hitter in the lineup.

They needed a right fielder, so they traded for Jose Guillen in August. They did not appear to need another outfielder a week later, but by claiming Cody Ross on waivers, they could keep him away from the San Diego Padres. Guillen gotinjured, and Ross emerged as the most valuable player of the National League Championship Series.

“We’ve been in the right place at the right time, where you’re able to turn things around,” Sabean said. “You can do that when your pitching is that strong. You can do things that are, quote, gambles, or maybe not your first choice.”

The Giants’ pitching is that strong. They gave up 583 runs, their fewest for a full season since 1968.

“In this ballpark, if you can pitch, you can win,” said J.T. Snow, the Giants’ first baseman from 1997 to 2005. “Pitch the ball, catch the ball and take the offense where you can get it.”

The Giants lost their way in the final years of the Bonds era, to their benefit. The fans packed the ballpark to witness Bonds’ overtaking of Hank Aaron, and the team stumbled so badly that it could draft in the top 10 in three consecutive years.

Those draft picks turned into Lincecum, pitcher Madison Bumgarner and stellar catcher Buster Posey.

Pitcher Matt Cain was a first-round pick in 2002. Pitcher Jonathan Sanchez came in the draft too, and so the Giants boast the first entirely homegrown postseason rotation since the 1986 Boston Red Sox.

“The goal here is to win and develop at the same time,” Giants President Larry Baer said. “It’s hard to do. It’s often illusory. It’s possible.

“You have to have good strong drafts. There’s no margin for error for us in the draft.”

The Giants milked Bonds until he set the record because he attracted fans, and the owners needed that revenue to pay the mortgage on their privately financed ballpark. Attendance dropped 11% in the first post-Bonds season, when the Giants lost 90 games, and has yet to recover fully.

“The energy in the park is equal — if not better — now,” said closer Brian Wilson, who played with the team during Bonds’ last two seasons.

San Francisco is four victories from its first Series championship parade, powered not by the slugger so beloved in the city and so loathed elsewhere.

“Back then, we didn’t have the pitching,” Sanchez said. “We didn’t have the quality starters we have now.

“It’s just about pitching now. We’re here because of pitching. We score a couple of runs, and we’re pretty good.”

The Giants used that formula to win the NL West, for the first time in seven years. And what if the Giants should add a slugger or two to the mix?

“We’ll finish in first place 10 more years,” Sanchez said.

bill.shaikin@latimes.com