Giants fans still mourning the loss of Barry Bonds (anybody?) should take heart: the statistics monkeys over at High Heat Stats have crunched some numbers and determined that the Giants have had roughly the same win percentage in the post Bonds-years as they had during Barry's 15-year heyday. Obviously, since Bonds only left in 2007, his data pool is drawn from a much larger time period, and the Giants have had a pretty good four years since he left the game, but a difference of .003 is still pretty tiny given the wailing and gnashing of teeth that we've witnessed.
Of course, just because the Giants can still win games without Bonds doesn't always mean they go about winning them in the same way. Check out their stats on runs scored per game:
1993-2007 (Bonds era) Average NL Scoring per Game: 4.66 runs Average SF Runs Scored Per Game: 4.82 Average SF Runs Allowed Per Game: 4.622008-2012 (Post-Bonds era)
Average NL Scoring per Game: 4.34 runs
Average SF Runs Scored Per Game: 4.03
Average SF Runs Allowed Per Game: 3.93
As the author adds in a comment, "It would have taken would have taken an increase in team run scoring of about .45 runs the last five years to get the Giants back to the level above the NL average that they were sustaining when [Bonds] was with the team." Instead, the Giants have been able to make up the loss of runs with improved pitching and defense, which admittedly have the disadvantage of not making cool splashing sounds.
