Controversial Major League Baseball home run king Barry Bonds will reunite with the San Francisco Giants when he joins them in spring training as a special instructor for the team. While he remains a questionable figure in a lot of people's minds, Giants catcher Buster Posey and other players are excited to learn from him.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, Posey is anxious to learn from Bonds and is looking to ask him about his approach to the plate.
"I'm excited just to listen, for sure," Posey told the newspaper. "From talking to people that either coached him or played with him, everybody said he had a very straightforward, simple approach. To me, that's a huge part of hitting, trying to keep things as simple as possible."
First baseman Brandon Belt, who recently avoided arbitration with the Giants by agreeing to a one-year, $2.9 million deal, is also excited to learn from the former slugger.
"It's one of those things where he comes in and you try to pick his brain as much as possible," Belt said via the San Francisco Chronicle. "It seems like he did everything right. When you talk to hitting coaches around here, they point to him as the specimen to follow."
According to ESPN, Bonds is expected to arrive to the Giants spring training complex in the second week of March and will join former San Francisco players such as Jeff Kent, Robb Nen, Will Clark and J.T. Snow as an instructor to the team.
Bonds, 49, who hasn't made it to the baseball Hall of Fame since retiring in 2007 due to suspicion that his impressive career numbers were put up with the help of performance enhancing drugs, spent the final 15 years of his baseball career with the Giants.
Giants manager Bruce Bochy told ESPN on Saturday that he is looking forward to Bonds instructing his players.
The Giants have won the World Series twice in the past four years, but missed the playoffs entirely in 2013 after finishing 76-86 and tied for third in the National League West.
Bonds set major league records for home runs with 762 in his career and set the single-season mark in 2001 with the Giants when he launched 73 long-balls. He remains a controversial figure, but he's beloved in San Francisco and will be with the Giants for spring training--much to the excitement of the players.
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