Give Oakland an A-Plus if Giambi Makes a Deal

The swaggering first baseman of the Oakland Athletics batted .333 last year, slugged 43 homers, drove in 137 runs, led his surprising team to the final inning of the final game of the American League’s division series with the New York Yankees and won the league’s most-valuable-player award.

So, what would Manager Art Howe like to see from Jason Giambi this spring?

“I’d like to see that he knows how to sign his name,” Howe said, suppressing a laugh but not the obvious hope that Giambi and the A’s will reach a multiyear contract agreement, nullifying his free-agent eligibility at the end of the 2001 season.

The young and talented A’s, of course, already carry Giambi’s Animal House signature.

Trying to get his name on an agreement that will stretch their small-market revenue is another matter, although both Giambi and the A’s are cautiously optimistic. The club is believed to have offered six years at about $91 million, and the only real difference may involve the A’s desire to defer about $3 million of the annual salary over an extended period.

“I’m optimistic that we’re going to get it worked out,” Giambi said in the A’s clubhouse. “I want to spend the rest of my career here and the A’s have made it apparent that they want me here, to stay as the leader, to help get the team to the next level.

“I’m not worried about it and don’t see it as something that will be on my mind [if not resolved before the start of the season]. I’m excited. I strongly believe this is the team to go to the World Series. I don’t think there’s a much more talented group of guys anywhere unless it’s the Yankees, and even then I’m not sure.”

Well, the Yankees have won three consecutive World Series and four of the last five, but there is no denying the A’s confidence and potential after a basically home grown-team won the AL West and took the Yankees to the brink of elimination in the division series.

Now, with the addition of center fielder Johnny Damon in a three-way trade with Kansas City and Tampa Bay, Giambi feels the A’s are better in every way, and that he will be better in every way.

“I drove in 137 runs last year,” he said. “If Johnny Damon has the year we expect him to have [as leadoff man], I may drive in 150.”

Said General Manager Billy Beane, who should be the choice to replace Kevin Malone as Dodger general manager when that inevitable move is made:

“We came out of last season feeling we needed to improve our team speed and outfield defense. Damon fits both to a T.

“Otherwise, given the potential of our young players, we just needed another birthday or two. I mean, they matured so much last year. They not only played well in September, when most young teams fail, they played better than anybody in baseball.

“And then, in Yankee Stadium, with a 21-year-old rookie [Barry Zito] on the mound and everyone saying the [division series] was over, they brought it back to Oakland [for a climactic Game 5].

“People ask about expectations, but these guys have been through the war already.”

Now, Damon and designated hitter John Jaha, coming back from shoulder surgery, could be the only non-Oakland products in the regular lineup, and Gil Heredia could be the only transient in a rotation led by the potential 20-game winners Zito and Tim Hudson.

Terrence Long, runner-up for rookie of the year, will move from center to left, making room for Damon and replacing Ben Grieve, who went to Tampa Bay in the Damon deal. In right, Adam Piatt will replace Matt Stairs, who was allowed to leave as a free agent, and Jesus Ortiz, the Pacific Coast League’s most valuable player despite 32 errors, will move up to play second, replacing Randy Velarde, who was traded to Texas.

Are the A’s taking a chance with Ortiz?

“Not any more of a chance than we took with our other young players,” Beane said. “It’s a necessity [because of limited payroll] and the foundation of our success. We may give up some defense and experience early, but Ortiz is younger, cheaper and has the potential to be better [than Velarde].

“Our young players have demonstrated that a half step back can lead to two forward.”

At 29, Giambi is the veteran bellwether who wonders just how good guys like Hudson and Miguel Tejada and Eric Chavez will be at his age, considering how good they are already.

“The kids came so fast,” he said. “We were winning despite errors and mistakes, the talent was just so good. The one thing I told the guys when the year was over was that we had no reason to be ashamed, but we didn’t want to be satisfied just winning the division and taking the Yankees to five games. I said we still have something to prove and room for improvement.

“Hopefully, we’ve gained that one piece of pie we didn’t have before, and that’s experience. We’ve gone from a team that lost 97 games to a team that won the division, and now we’re about to see if we can get to the World Series. We’ve got the team and the potential, and the one thing I preach to the kids is that no player in this room is bigger than any other. We’re kind of like a Little League team just going out and having fun.”

For Giambi, much of who he is and what he believes in stems from mentor Mark McGwire, who has stressed the importance of consistency and always trying to improve.

“I never want to be satisfied,” Giambi said. “Maybe I do have the chance to hit 50 or 60 homers. Maybe I can drive in 160 runs and bat .370. As long as you keep striving, that’s how you keep your love for the game.”

How long the financially limited A’s can keep their young team together is a significant question. The payroll went from $32 million to $38 million in the 2000 aftermath. It’s always a shell game, said Beane, “and that’s good in that it forces us to be disciplined and creative, but ultimately we will have to have a new ballpark, not only for us to succeed but exist.”

There is nothing definitive on the ballpark front, and now Giambi is the first of the young A’s to reach the crossroads. He wants to stay and probably will, a teammate of brother Jeremy and master of a 5-year-old Australian sheep dog called Slugger, who is always at his heels in the spring clubhouse, a third Giambi so to speak, or as deadpan Howe said of the expanded and shaggy clan, “yeah, and they all look alike.”

SHEF AND NOMAR

Gary Sheffield’s latest rant that he is getting buried for wanting a lifetime extension while no one says anything about the Boston Red Sox renegotiating Nomar Garciaparra’s seven-year, $42.25-million contract that has four years left misses the point on several levels.

1. Garciaparra is 27. Sheffield is 32, and will be 36 when his current contract expires. 2. Garciaparra plays a far more demanding position, and wins games with his glove as well as his bat (which has accounted for two consecutive batting titles). 3. The Red Sox didn’t require urging, recognizing that the signings of Alex Rodriguez and Derek Jeter dramatically changed the shortstop salary scale and additionally recognizing that Garciaparra’s performance has been comparable to Rodriguez and Jeter.

Bring on Jay Payton. Please.

THE BONDS MARKET

Agent Scott Boras thinks Barry Bonds has been wrongly lumped with this spring’s Greed Group seeking extensions or renegotiations. Bonds, in the final year of a three-year, $22.9-million extension and eligible for free agency when the season ends, arrived in the San Francisco camp and told reporters he would like to know what the club’s intentions are, that he has done enough in his career that he shouldn’t be left in contract limbo.

“Barry never made a demand to renegotiate or do anything,” Boras said. “He has two children [from a previous marriage] and simply would like to know whether the Giants want him back so that he has some idea of the future from a family standpoint.”

Boras met with General Manager Brian Sabean this week and came away with the impression that their “baseball people regard Barry as a core player and they plan to sit down with ownership and see how ownership wants to handle it. From our standpoint, if they’re willing to negotiate, we’d be ready to do that now.”

Bonds, 36, hit a career-high 49 homers last year while driving in 106 runs, but the Giants are also coming up to multiyear talks with Jeff Kent and Shawn Estes and are wary of getting into a leverage battle with Boras, though it might be easier now than on the eve of his client’s free agency.

THE HIGH LIFE

The Brewers have drawn more than 2 million only once in Milwaukee, but could reach 3 million in Miller Park’s inaugural season, prompting Bud Selig’s favorite team to start acting like a big-market entity. Two young sluggers, Geoff Jenkins and Richie Sexson, signed four-year deals totaling $35 million last weekend, and Jeromy Burnitz received a two-year, $20-million extension Thursday.

Of course, the Brewers just got out of a $5-million obligation to Marquis Grissom for next year, dumping it in the financial wastebasket that is the Dodgers. Said Manager Davey Lopes: “This addresses a lot of that negative thought process when you’re in a market such as ours that we’re not going to be able to keep guys.”

TEDDY BALLGAME?

The Time Warner merger with AOL seems to have changed Ted Turner’s role with the Atlanta Braves--at least in the club’s media guide. He is no longer listed as owner, and there is no biographical data for the first time in 25 years. He is listed only as vice chairman and senior advisor of AOL Time Warner, and is pictured only as a member of the club’s board of directors.

A reduction in power and prominence?

“I still intend to jump when he tells me to,” President Stan Kasten said.