"With Opening Night drawing near, The Chronicle sat down with third baseman Eric Chavez, the longest tenured A's player, and the team's returning first baseman, Jason Giambi. Among other things, the two old friends and teammates talked about playing together again after seven years apart, the upcoming season and knuckle balls.

Q: When did you both have an idea Jason would be coming back this way?

Eric Chavez: Actually, the year before I heard something, someone threw the idea out there.

Jason Giambi: He missed me (laughs). ... and he said, 'You know what, I need you back.' That's why I made my decision.

EC: Anytime anything is talked about in Oakland, it kind of doesn't happen. We started talking about it, and I'm like, oh, he probably isn't going to be here. Then as the winter went on, it became pretty apparent he would.

Q: You've said before you thought Jason helped you win one or two of your Gold Gloves, is that true?

EC: No doubt. Go back and look at a lot of my errors and they're throwing errors, not many are fielding. He picked a lot of my throws. I was bad my first couple of years, I threw just sinkers. The good thing was, I didn't have a good enough arm so they were all soft ones he was picking up. If I had a good arm, I would have worn him out.

JG: I would have been chasing them too far. Definitely from the time he came up, Chavvy had some of the best hands I've seen at third base. I took pride in helping him and (Miguel) Tejada and worked with (Ron) Washington on balls in the dirt - because it's such a far run at the Coliseum, it would be three bases, you know?

EC: Not to bash anyone who came after Jason, but there was a big difference. You worry about making a good throw rather than knowing it was going to get picked.

Q: Do you see much of a change in Jason since he was here last time?

EC: The only thing I've seen is he's throwing knuckleballs back to the pitchers (laughs).

JG: You've got to have some fun. You know who taught me that? (Pitcher Tom) Candiotti.

EC: That's the funniest thing I've ever seen."