Apparently, The  SF Giants have gotten Barry Bonds to agree to do a press briefing in each road city that the Giants travel to, on the first day of the series, and to do them in the dugout.  I’m sure you realize that most beat reporters don’t have access to the slugger except when he is in their town.  This means that in a visitors clubhouse their could be 4-10 extra people hanging around waiting to speak to a guy who is working on avoiding them.  Bonds still sells papers and so those guys need him to be available, so they stand around waiting for him to appear, sometimes for hours.  And he may never.  And the visitors clubhouse in most parks does not have a lot of extra space.  Getting Bonds to agree to do this helps his teammates a lot, helps the press a lot, and therefore helps the team.  It also means that Bonds will have a lot of opportunities to hang himself in the court of public opinion, because he won’t be able to avoid those questions anymore.

Are you waiting to hear what ridiculous story I want you to watch next?  Well, this is where you are tempted to click that X in the corner of your browser, because you are going to think I am out of my head.  The story is the Colorado Rockies.  They are my sleeper pick for the NL West.  I think there are a few teams on paper stronger, but if all their young players fall into place, then this team could surprise everyone.  Haven’t we been saying this for a few years? Well, yes.  But the Giants are still old, and the Dodgers are a mixed bag.  Some people think that the Diamondbacks could be the surprise in that division, and either way the West could be interesting.  Keep an eye on Brad Hawpe to give Matt Holliday a run for team slugger.  Todd Helton, btw, will be the highest paid player in the NL West this year.  He makes a little over $17 million, while Jason Schmidt will make just over $16 million and Bonds will earn $15.8 million. The Yanks are paying ARod less then all three for their share of his salary, and so I think thats a bargain.

Well, I think that’s all I got for today.