Strawberry Signs With Giants : Baseball: They hope to have troubled former Dodger in right field by July 11, replacing McGee.

Darryl Strawberry, having completed a drug rehabilitation program at the Betty Ford Center, took the first step toward rehabilitating his baseball career Sunday by signing to play the remainder of the season for the San Francisco Giants. The team hopes he will be playing right field for them by the All-Star Break, July 11.

“Like anybody who lives in this country, he deserves another chance,” Giant Manager Dusty Baker said. “I’m looking forward to him joining the team next month.”

Strawberry, who has not played in a regular-season major league game since June of last season, will begin a conditioning program under team supervision and follow that with a minor league assignment. He will replace right fielder Willie McGee, who is sidelined for the season because of a ruptured Achilles’ tendon.

Strawberry, 32, has not spoken publicly since telling the Dodgers on April 4 that he had a drug abuse problem. After he completed a program at the Betty Ford center, Strawberry’s doctors recommended a change of playing environment, and the Dodgers mutually agreed to release Strawberry on May 25.

Strawberry was not at the news conference in San Francisco, but he said in a statement he believes “that being a member of the Giants presented a comfortable atmosphere for my return to the game.”

“I’ve missed the competitiveness and can’t wait until I can actively join the club and hopefully contribute to a pennant-winning season.”

Financial terms were not disclosed, but it is believed that the Giants are paying Strawberry the major league minimum of $109,000, prorated to about $63,000.

Strawberry was already paid $642,857 by the Dodgers this season and, in his settlement, the club agreed to pay him $4,857,143 by July 1. That includes the balance of his 1994 salary and half of the $5 million owed Strawberry for next season, which was the final year of his five-year, $20.25-million contract.

Dodger players said that they wished Strawberry the best.

“I just hope he’s been able to get himself together so that the same things don’t present themselves again,” second baseman Delino DeShields said.

“I don’t have any doubt about his ability.”

Center fielder Brett Butler said that Strawberry has stopped by his house and they have talked on the phone a few times recently.

“I’m not surprised that he signed with the Giants, because I know Dusty’s relationship with Straw,” Butler said.

“He can carry a club and we all know that. . . . I would have preferred not to have him in the league. I’ll have to call and congratulate him.”

The Giants are hoping Strawberry will help revive the worst offense in the league. The team is nine games under .500 and 5 1/2 games behind the Dodgers in the National League West.

Strawberry, 32, has a .259 lifetime batting average and hit at least 26 home runs every season from 1983-1991. But, bothered by a back injury, he played in a total of 75 games the last two seasons with the Dodgers, hitting only 10 homers and driving in 37 runs.

“I hope as I have always hoped that Darryl has a long and successful career, and has in life in order,” Dodger Executive Vice President Fred Claire said.

“We will have had a part in that, just like other players who have gone through trying times, like Steve Howe and Bobby Welch. You want to see them succeed. That doesn’t stop, it continues.”