Giants Doing What They Need to Do

So now the San Francisco Giants play 10 games against the Dodgers and Houston Astros before heading to Pittsburgh and Philadelphia, and if you want to say that it’s about time, that you were beginning to think they were going to play all 162 games against the dregs from San Diego and Milwaukee, that their sizzling start is finally going to be put to a truer test ... well, OK, but it’s not as if they approached the Padres and Brewers with the cool detachment of an outing on McCovey Cove.

The Giants did what they had to do, what they felt they needed to do, considering they were beginning this season with 67-year-old Felipe Alou replacing Dusty Baker at the helm, with four new players in their lineup, with the pain of their World Series loss to the Angels almost as persistent as the bay fog.

“All I know is that 8-1 is 8-1,” first baseman J.T. Snow said of the Giants’ best nine-game start since 1938, when they were in New York.

“It all adds up in the end, and it’s not as if we made up the schedule,” Snow said.

In other words, somebody had to open against the Padres and Brewers, and the Giants weren’t going to turn down the opportunity as they contemplated their new positions and personalities and weighed the importance of confidence and momentum when they later face the more demanding segments of the schedule.

“It’s obviously a long year,” Snow said, “but a lot of us felt in spring training that getting off to a good start was big, maybe even a key to the season.

“Look at it this way. If we hadn’t gotten off to a good start, there would be people talking already about how we missed some of the guys who aren’t here.”

Those guys include Jeff Kent, David Bell, Reggie Sanders and Kenny Lofton, who all left as free agents, and 16-game winner Russ Ortiz, who was traded to Atlanta for economic reasons.

Damian Moss was acquired in the Ortiz trade to help pick up some of that rotation slack, and General Manager Brian Sabean reloaded the lineup with Edgardo Alfonzo, Ray Durham, Marquis Grissom and Jose Cruz Jr.

“Everybody wanted to put the emphasis on what we lost instead of the high caliber players we brought in,” shortstop Rich Aurilia said.

“Once we knew what the team was going to be, I don’t think there was any concern among the players who were coming back.”

The Jan. 28 signing of Cruz was the last of the major acquisitions and prompted Alou to predict the Giants would be back in the playoffs.

There are potential problems obscured by the 8-1 record, but Alou said he has seen no reason to retract that display of faith.

He is clearly energized by a stability unlike anything he experienced during his long and often frustrating tenure with the Montreal Expos.

After watching the Giants erase a 4-0 deficit with seven runs in the first inning on their way to a 15-11 win over the Padres on Wednesday, Alou sat alone in his office, laughed and said, “If we had gone 8-1 in Montreal, they’d have traded five or six of my players already.”

The Giants have operated amid financial restrictions as well, but since Sabean became the GM in 1997 they have the National League’s second-best record, consistently finding the right pieces.

The way the Giants are now aligned, said Snow, “I think we’re more athletic than we’ve been. We still have power, but we can run more, bunt, force the action. Felipe has an aggressive mind-set. He likes to keep the pressure on.”

There’s still the dreaded presence of Barry Bonds in the middle, of course, but Padre Manager Bruce Bochy thinks the Giants have become a different team.

“Overall,” he said, “they’re stronger throughout the lineup. They don’t depend as much on three or four guys. They get production from everybody.”

Ultimately, however, the Giants have to replace Kent’s 30 homers and 100 runs batted in.

They have to find a way to protect Bonds, a way to “get our big guy some better pitches,” said Alou, who on Wednesday replaced the slumping Alfonzo in that role with the hot-hitting Cruz.

They also have to hope for some rotation reliability behind Jason Schmidt and Kirk Rueter or an already strained bullpen -- devoid of closer Robb Nen as he continues to rehabilitate a surgically repaired shoulder -- will be gassed by May.

Said Bonds, expressing caution: “Until we see how this group reacts to adversity, talk is cheap. My evaluation will be determined by how this group reacts when things get tough.”

A key to the 8-1 start, said Grissom, is that each of the four new position players is a veteran “who understands his role, and that made it an easier transition for us and the team.”

Grissom was a significant role player with the Dodgers during the last two years and said he is happy and excited to be with the one team that “gave me the opportunity to be an everyday center fielder.” He said, however, that he has only positive reflections on his time in Los Angeles and couldn’t be drawn into any cross-fire on the eve of tonight’s rivalry renewal.

Nor could Alou, a Giant outfielder during some of the halcyon years of the rivalry.

“My former [Montreal] bench coach is now the Dodger manager, and that makes it a very tough situation,” Alou said, referring to Jim Tracy.

“Aside from my brothers [Matty and Jesus], he’s one of my closest friends in uniform. I hope we beat them, of course, but he’s an outstanding guy.”

The Giants are done beating up on the Padres and Brewers for a while, done doing what they needed to do, and as Aurilia said: “It doesn’t matter who you’re playing, only how you play. There’s a ton of teams that would trade places with us.

“We know we have tougher series ahead, but we have some wins and momentum under our belt and we’re confident about our ability to carry on from here.”