SF Giants: Young Players the Talk of Camp

The Giants' full squad has been at work for almost a week now, and most the talk around the Giants camp has been of the young players that will fill out this teams' roster come opening day. Normally around this time, bay area newspapers are bombarded with articles about the Giants and Barry Bonds. There is no Bonds this year, and the talk is all Giants. There has been plenty of attention this spring shown towards the stud pitchers Matt Cain, Tim Lincecum and Brian Wilson, as well as the teams young outfielders and second basemen Kevin Frandsen. One of least talked about names, and a guy who I'm sure a lot of casual Giants' fans aren't familiar with is John Bowker. It looks like the Giants may have future plans for the 24-year old power bat who led all Giants minor leaguer's with 22 home runs and 90 RBI's in AA ball last season. A 22 home run season doesn't jump out at you too much, but he hit them playing in the Eastern League which is very rich with pitching and big ballparks so that. He also made the Eastern League All-Star team which is no small feat for a young Giants' minor league hitter. Due to the fact that there are about 7 outfielders currently ahead of him on the depth chart, Bowker has started taking ground balls at first base spring to see if he may have a future at first. I am all for this move and if he can make a transition to first like Dan Ortmeier has done, he could be a very intriguing bat to follow this season. In all likelihood, unless he absolutely kills the ball this spring, Bowker will began the year in Fresno, and it's very possible he could be starting at first there. Fresno has a couple outfielders returning from last years squad and it's very possible that either Fred Lewis or Nate Schierholtz will occupy one of the outfield spots. All signs are pointing towards first base as being Bowker's fastest ticket to the big leagues.

The Giants' will kick off their cactus league schedule Thursday vs. the Cubs with Noah Lowry getting the nod to start. Before that, they will hold an intersquad game on Wednesday. Although it's only going to be the first game of the spring, I am very curious to see how Bochy fills out his lineup early on. I think the Giants will make a trade for a third basemen at some point in the spring so the lineup you see on Thursday could change a lot by March 31'st season opener Ande Marte and Joe Crede seem to be the two most likely targets for the Giants but Marte showed up in Indians camp overweight and Crede still has to answer questions regarding his back. The only guarantees I'm expecting to see are Dave Roberts and Rajai Davis leading off, Bengie Molina in the 4th spot and Aaron Rowand in the 5th. After that, Boch could go with a variety of different orders.

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