Padre Notebook : Boros Is Ready to Try a Couple of Experiments

With the Padres’ exhibition opener one day away, Manager Steve Boros is eager to try two experiments.

His grand experiment: Seeing whether rookie Bip Roberts can take over at second base.

Experiment No. 2: Seeing whether Kevin McReynolds can be an effective No. 3 hitter.

The results of Roberts’ early workouts are satisfactory. Boros and his coaches like the way Roberts fields, hits and runs. But they would like to know how he matches up against major league competition.

“We want to see him under game conditions,” Boros said. “We want to give him a lot of playing time to see whether he’s ready.”

Boros also wants to draw a conclusion on whether to bat McReynolds third and move Steve Garvey to cleanup. After Wednesday’s practice, Boros said he “appreciated the effort” McReynolds gave in running from first to third base on singles during fundamental drills.

Before Dick Williams resigned last week, McReynolds was the manager’s pet peeve. Now that Boros is in charge, McReynolds has become a pet project.

“He would give us more speed in the No. 3 spot,” Boros said. “We’re talking about being a lot more aggressive. We’ll see how it looks, but I look for Mac to be batting 3, 4 or 5 during the year. Of course, Steve (Garvey) used to hit fourth with the Dodgers. It’s not a place he’s unaccustomed to.”

In Friday’s exhibition opener against the Angels, the tentative lineup is Roberts (2B), Tony Gwynn (RF), McReynolds (CF), Garvey (1B), Terry Kennedy (C), Carmelo Martinez (LF), Garry Templeton (SS), Jerry Royster (3B) and Eric Show (P).

Boros said the right-handed Royster is starting in place of Graig Nettles because the Angels will pitch left-handers John Candelaria and Gary Lucas. Nettles is scheduled to start Saturday and Sunday against the Angels.

According to Boros, the Padres are counting on productive seasons from McReynolds, Gwynn, Kennedy and Martinez.

“I still maintain those youngsters haven’t had their peak years,” Boros said. “I know Tony Gwynn won a batting championship (in 1984), but he wants to do more. It’s amazing. You have young players who were on a championship ballclub two years ago and still have their best years ahead of them.”

Goose Gossage has been slowed in practice by soreness in his right knee, which underwent arthroscpoic surgery last summer for a torn articulating cartilage. Gossage is not scheduled to pitch until early next week, according to Boros.

“Goose is all right,” he said. “We want to be a little careful with him.”

Sight of the Day: Around the team’s hotel swimming pool Wednesday afternoon, blonde model Darci Turner of Yuma was being photographed for a local boutique’s advertisement.

When she got up from her chair, Padre General Manager Jack McKeon sat down, wearing a bathing suit and smoking a foot-long cigar. The photographer was not amused.

“I told him to take my picture,” McKeon said. “He said he was out of film.”

Nice excuse.

Padre president Ballard Smith is expected to ask his players today to adopt a voluntary drug testing program that is identical to the one being used by the Baltimore Orioles.

The key word is “voluntary.” If a player doesn’t want to sign Smith’s proposal, he doesn’t have to.

At least one player, Gwynn, will sign. Smith visited the team last Thursday and distributed copies of the Oriole plan, asking players to run it by their respective lawyers. Gwynn did, and his attorney, Lou Muller, already has approved it.

“My agent said it was good,” Gwynn said. “If Ballard comes in with a program today, I’ll sign it. Everyone doesn’t have to agree to it, but I will. I have nothing to hide.”

In the Oriole program, testing is done through individual hospitals instead of the baseball team, and confidentiality is the central theme. It is likely, sources said, that the Padres have found a hospital in California that can do the testing for the players.