  We study the handbag contribution to two-photon annihilation into
baryon-antibaryon pairs at large energy and momentum transfer. We derive
factorization of the process amplitude into a hard gamma gamma -> q qbar
subprocess and form factors describing the soft q qbar -> B Bbar transition,
assuming that the process is dominated by configurations where the (anti)quark
approximately carries the full momentum of the (anti)baryon. The form factors
represent moments of time-like generalized parton distributions, so-called B
Bbar distribution amplitudes. A characteristic feature of the handbag mechanism
is the absence of isospin-two components in the final state, which in
combination with flavor symmetry provides relations among the form factors for
the members of the lowest-lying baryon octet. Assuming dominance of the handbag
contribution, we can describe current experimental data with form factors of
plausible size, and predict the cross sections of presently unmeasured B Bbar
channels.
