Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Alex Gannon / San Francisco Giants Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle

Giants fans arriving at Friday’s home opener can gaze up at the big ballpark clock — or the spot where it used to be — and realize the times are changing.

When the Giants disassembled their old scoreboard to make way for a flashy new one, they had no initial plan for the iconic timepiece with orange and black numbers, orange trim and black hands.

It served its purpose, from the first pitch delivered by Kirk Rueter in the ballpark’s inaugural season in 2000 until the final pitch in 2018, thrown by the Dodgers’ Julio Urias.

The Giants considered discarding the old clock as part of the plans for the 10,700-square-foot, $10 million video board. After all, who would want a contraption that’s 16 feet in diameter and weighs more than a thousand pounds?

Well, Steve Kowalski would.

Kowalski, 63, is the man behind the clock. He designed it in 1998 and, for a few years, paid thousands of dollars for the right to have his company name, Timeworks, displayed in block letters between the 10 and the 2.

In February, as the Giants prepared to put up the new scoreboard, which is three times the surface of the old one, the clock came down. But where would it go?

I’ve known Kowalski for years, and was curious what would happen to it.

So I asked Bill Schlough, the Giants’ senior vice president and chief information officer who oversaw the construction of the new scoreboard, about the clock’s fate. Schlough said nobody had stepped up and asked to haul it away.

It seemed destined for the dump.

Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle

The clock was a ballpark fixture. Players, managers and staff came and went. The ballpark went through four names. Barry Bonds, Tim Lincecum and Rusty the Mechanical Man played out their years, but the clock never budged.

It let fans know how much time before the first pitch as they crossed the Lefty O’Doul Bridge and how much time before the last ferry departed.

Its origin traces to a late ’90s meeting between Kowalski and managing general partner Peter Magowan at Magowan’s Candlestick Park office.

Kowalski had manufactured clocks out of his Berkeley company Timeworks and sent a specially designed Giants clock to Magowan as a way of thanking him for his part in keeping the team in San Francisco.

At the time there was no plan for a clock at the new ballpark, and Magowan met with Kowalski to discuss erecting one. Not long thereafter, Kowalski got the go-ahead to design it. It was constructed in Oregon and installed in November 1999, in time for the 2000 opener.

“It was totally awesome,” Kowalski said. “Every time I went to the ballpark, whether I was taking the day off on a Wednesday or Thursday, I’d get there 30 to 45 minutes early, sit with a bratwurst with grilled onions and a beer and see my clock up there. That was pretty cool. I did that for 19 years.”

Photo: Liz Hafalia / SFC

Kowalski always made sure to check that the time on the clock reflected the official time of the first pitch, “and it always did,” he said. “That made me proud and happy that a mechanical clock could still be relied on.”

The new clock isn’t really a clock as much as a round-shaped digital display that will be above the scoreboard. Sometimes it’ll have the appearance of a clock. Sometimes it’ll be used for other purposes.

When I told Kowalski that his clock’s time was up, he was stunned. He figured the Giants would incorporate it into the new board.

His initial response: “They’re swapping out a cool retro clock for an oversized Apple Watch. It goes counter to the original plans for Pac Bell Park.”

Would he want to take the clock back? A long pause followed. He couldn’t exactly take it home on his 2000 Dodge pickup or hang it above his mantel. But, yes, he said, he’d absolutely want it.

He’s a clock man at heart. No matter the size, apparently. And this was the largest clock he had ever designed.

Photo: Michael Short / Special To The Chronicle

I put Kowalski in touch with Schlough, and they pretty quickly reached an agreement. Kowalski was going to pick it up the following week.

Well, Schlough spoke too soon. He was trying to do a good deed and leave the clock in good hands, so to speak. The Giants eventually chose to keep it, at least for now, and store it in their off-site warehouse.

The decision was made by Mario Alioto, the Giants’ executive VP of business operations and an avid fan of nostalgia and the team’s history.

“That clock has been part of many memories since the park opened,” Alioto said. “My thought was, whether large or small, it’s part of who we are. I have no idea what we’ll ever do with it. I just think holding on to a piece of history like that is really important.”

Alioto cited the five-foot metallic G-I-A-N-T-S letters the team has in its possession. For decades, they were displayed outside the Polo Grounds, the Giants’ home in New York. An advertising executive and collector, Mike Doyle, contacted Alioto in the ’90s to ask if the team would want them — even though the N-Y letters were missing.

Alioto jumped at the opportunity and set up Doyle with season tickets for a year. The six letters were placed on the infield during the 2004 reunion of the 1954 World Series championship team. Last season they were displayed in an exhibit at the Lefty O’Doul Gate.

“There are stories behind these things,” Alioto said. “Our job as caretakers for the franchise is to tell those stories to other generations when the time comes.”

Kowalski is fine with the Giants keeping the clock but asked if he could be considered if the team eventually decides to let it go. The Giants agreed, saying Kowalski would have first dibs.

“I went from the excitement of thinking I’d have this iconic clock to, ‘Well, it’s not going to happen, and maybe that’s for the better,’” said Kowalski, who suggested the clock could find a home at another locale, perhaps Scottsdale Stadium, the Giants’ spring-training park where the scoreboard clock seems undersized.

The Giants did give Kowalski something that might have more sentimental value than the clock itself.

He received a bronze plaque that had been mounted on a railing behind the clock. It’s a home plate-sized tribute to Kowalski’s brother, Larry, a longtime Giants fan who died while bicycling in Italy in 2008. Clubhouse manager Mike Murphy, who knows Steve Kowalski well, had arranged for the plaque to be mounted.

Larry Kowalski, a friend of Mike Krukow from their days in San Luis Obispo, received a kidney transplant in February 2005, and Steve Kowalski was the donor. Both had season tickets and served many times as ball dudes, including on Organ Donor Awareness Night.

“It was cool that it was up there for all those years,” said Steve Kowalski, who plans to give the plaque to his brother’s son, Brandon. “It’s going to have a nice home.”

John Shea is The San Francisco Chronicle’s national baseball writer. Email: jshea@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JohnSheaHey