By Mychael Urban / MLB.com
SAN FRANCISCO -- The Giants' first big-ticket acquisition of the post-Barry Bonds era was former White Sox and Phillies center fielder Aaron Rowand, who signed a five-year, $60 million free-agent deal last month.
Eager to embrace his leadership role on a team intent on building a contender with strong pitching, defense and a "gamer" mentality that many fans felt was lacking in Bonds' final years, Rowand on Wednesday showed up at AT&T Park for a series of half-hour individual interviews with a variety of local media outlets to discuss.
Here's a sampling of what Bay Area newspapers had to say about the meet-and-greets:
San Francisco Chronicle: The Giants, during Peter Magowan's ownership, always have been about selling personalities, which is one reason Bonds was around for 15 years and one reason the team committed $126 million to pitcher Barry Zito a year ago.
... Rowand said he wants to be a team player, just one of the gang. That might have been easy when he played for a Chicago White Sox team that boasted big personalities such as Frank Thomas and A.J. Pierzynski, or even in Philadelphia, where one could hide comfortably in Ryan Howard's shadow.
In San Francisco, the Giants will want Rowand to be an out-front guy.
"I'm comfortable being whatever they want me to be," he said. "I'm here to play, and play hard every day. If they want to put me on a billboard or a media guide or a commercial, that's fine with me. It couldn't bother me one way or the other."
... His short hair neatly coiffed, and his light mustache and goatee neatly trimmed, Rowand hardly looked like the down-and-dirty player he professes to be, a guy who bypassed better teams and signed with the Giants partly because they offered a fifth contract year, but also because manager Bruce Bochy told him he wants Rowand to infuse his style of play into what has been a staid team.
"Boch wanted to get the team going in a direction of playing the game hard, getting dirty, being aggressive," Rowand said. "He wants to build this team around that style of play, and that's the way I play. It's a very good fit for me as a player. In Chicago, they called it grinder style."
... One truth that Rowand swears by is the need for teammates to be close. To that end, he has taken large groups of players to dinner and paid the check ... while also hosting team parties. His goal: establishing cohesion that translates into wins.
"That's how you create chemistry," he said. "That's how you can hold people accountable, because you go up and say something to them and they're not going to get [mad] at you because they think you're attacking them. You're saying it to them as a friend and a teammate."
The Giants' clubhouse was nothing like that during the Bonds era. It often was a tense room. If Rowand can help fellow veterans Omar Vizquel, Dave Roberts, Randy Winn and others change the atmosphere in 2008 -- which figures to be a foundation year in a reconstruction process -- then the first chunk of his large contract might be deemed well-earned.
"You look at all the young guys in the clubhouse who've come up the last couple of years," Rowand said. "You've got Barry there, who's been there forever, who's been one of the best in the game for as long as he's been, it's tough to be yourself around someone of that stature. It's not Barry's fault. It's the monster that is being a celebrity and being as good as he is.
"With him out, guys might be a little more themselves."
San Jose Mercury News/Media News Group: New center fielder Aaron Rowand stopped by the Giants' ballpark Wednesday and said he looks forward to winning over the fans of San Francisco.
That should be a snap for a guy who earned unadulterated love from the notoriously prickly fans of Philadelphia.
How the heck did he do that?
"It was easy," Rowand said. "I ran into a fence."
Oh, yeah, that. In his 33rd game with the Phillies in 2006, the daredevil player ran face-first into the outfield wall.
He broke his nose.
He fractured his face.
He missed two weeks.
But he made the catch.
"Fans just want to see somebody who cares," Rowand said during a stopover at AT&T Park. "They just want somebody who goes out there and plays hard. They respect that."
If that quote sounds distinctly unlike a certain former Giants outfielder, it's not by accident.
... "When I go home every night, I can put my head on my pillow and go to sleep," [Rowand] said. "I don't lay there and wonder, 'What if I'd tried harder? What if I'd given more?'
"That's how I play. That's the game that I bring."
Fences, consider yourselves warned.
1 comment:
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