Well, that was a dispiriting affair! Tim Lincecum fell apart in the 4'th inning and Bartolo Colon and the A's pitchers got a lot of help from the home plate ump in the form of a ridiculously wide strike zone. Key Lines:
Brandon Crawford- 1 for 4, BB. BA= .234. If Crawford can get on base at a .400 clip, he's perfect for the 2 hole.
Melky Cabrera- 4 for 4, 2B. BA= .353. It was an empty 4 for 4, but that's not Melky's fault. He's become a veritable hit machine! He's at 895 for his career, so is almost a lock to pass 1000 this season. Right now, he's on a pace for 240 for the season. I know! Regression!! If he averages 200 for the next 10 seasons, by which time he will be 37 yo, he would have close to 3000!
Tim Lincecum- 4 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 3 BB, 5 K's. ERA= 6.04. Lots of theories out there about what's wrong with Tim. The current one making the rounds of the broadcasters on CSN Bay Area is he is worried about his velocity and trying to throw too hard. What is clear is that if he gets into the stretch, he's done. He just loses all location. I still think a big part of it is he really only has two pitches. The hitters have learned to lay off the splitter in the dirt and he doesn't have enough fastball nor does he command it well enough to rely on it as a single pitch.
Bartolo Colon- 5 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 BB, 7 K's. ERA= 4.09. Colon just pounds the strike zone with fastball after fastball and keeps hitters guessing as to location. He got a lot of help from the ump who had a ridiculous strike zone that was as inconsistent as it was wide. Yeah, it was inconsistent, but mostly favoring Colon. Low point of the game was the Giants loading the bases against him in the 5'th after falling behind 4-2 and Pagan and Belt both struck out looking, but both had called strikes way outside the zone early in the count which left them helpless against stuff on the inside corner.
LAD leads the Cards 1-0 in the 4'th inning of their game so we have to wait to see if the Giants lose a game in the standings or not.
The Giants now take to the road against the BrewCrew and Marlins. Madison Bumgarner takes the mound in Milwaukee facing Randy Wolf.
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timmy is injured, put him on the dl...even if he isnt injured, put him on the dl...he aint gonna figure it out in the bigs
ReplyDeleteforget the extended k-zone...and i was a bit ok with pagans k with bases juiced as it was an inside out pitch....but belt...k'ing twice without the bat leaving his shoulder? that cant happen...but it does to guys who shouldnt be in the bigs
was a bit upset with bochy extending loux to 3 ip...sacrificial lamb time
oh well...onto cheese head country
Colon is a good guy to hack against. He tries to steal strike one against hitters who are trying to be patient. Go up there ready to swing from the heels in the first pitch and there's a good chance you'll catch one, but he does move the FB around well.
DeleteI don't think Timmy is hurt and I'm not sure this is something he's going to "figure out." His FB velocity has eroded and hitters have figured out how to lay off the splitter. He hasn't made the re-adjustment and not sure he has the stuff for it. We may just have to be thankful he only has a 2 year contract instead of 7.
DeleteSaid it before, saying it again: Tim is no longer an elite pitcher. But he can still be a very good pitcher, IF he comes to terms with what he's got. Will he? I don't know.
DeleteBases loaded single to center and Timmy doesn't move off the mound to back up home? Was Belt running over and standing in front of him for the cutoff not a big enough clue? This is little league stuff here.
It's not that he's running into adversity. It's that he's not dealing with it well.
Will they ever have a beeper similar to what they have in tennis,to indicate balls not just outside but high,as an aid to the umpire? Umps calls shouldn't dictate who wins or loses. Calling balls and strikes isn't an easy job,that's why mlb should consider such a device. Umps are fallible, remember the ump call at 1st that cost a no hitter/or perfect game,can't remember which.Clearly Freak isn't right, the G's can ill afford to keep inserting him. They're 2-7 with him as a starter and with his out of synch mechanics, even relief pitching is out of the question.Madison,Matt,Barry and Ryan. Why do we need 5 starters? Ian.
ReplyDeleteThere's a reason why every team in baseball went to 5 starters many years ago and it's never changed back. I haven't seen the data, but I'd be willing to bet the average career length for established MLB starters is a lot longer now than in the days of 4 man rotations. There's just too much money at stake now. The pitchers and their agents would never agree to it except in tight pennant race and postseason situations.
DeleteI think this game may have hurt Timmy more than any of us. Timmy is a highly competitive guy. For him not to get the results he wants and to get clocked, well that hurts. Timmy is going to have to reinvent himself, maybe with lesser stuff. Whoever stole Timmy's mojo please give it back, pronto.
ReplyDeleteIf we haven't any promising starters in in the minors, or do we?, then start a long reliever.Just caught the hi-lites of Freak's wild pitch,Posey has to do a better job catching &finding the ball.Update,3 run 2 out jack puts L.A.up a run,top of 8.See how a 3 run (2 out)jack can turn a game around.Looks like an L.A. sweep of the WS Champ Cards.Yet another case where power hitting,not pitching,wins games. L.A. up by 7.Ian
ReplyDelete3 run HR's are good, but good pitching would have prevented that. Again, pointing to any one game is something anybody can to to prove any point. Sorry, not gonna fly here.
DeleteThat HR was hit by Scott effing Van Slyke! Right now, the Dodgers can do no wrong. Yeah, it's luck, but luck doesn't always even out over the course of a season.
DeleteBaseball can be streaky. If you think that outside of Matt Kemp the Doyers are a power hitting club, I'd like some of that clean canadian aqua you're sipping.
DeleteDid you miss the part where Billingsley got out of the no out bases juiced??? LA is pitching itself to victories. Very annoyiing...
DeleteThere is no one so blind, as he who WILL not see.Yeah,but good pitching didn't prevent it.I'm pointing to this evening's L.A. win as an example of a myriad games won by hitting and not by pitching. G's would've won the 2002 WS if they had pitching.Was it bad relieving or good Angels hitting? It's a moot point.Ian.
ReplyDeleteYou know, Brandon Crawford did Scott Van Slyke one better in his MLB debut. He hit a 4 run HR! Now THAT will win you some games, am i right? How many has Brandon Crawford hit since then? To point to Scott Van Slyke and say that is what the Giants need more of is about as ludicrous as thinking Brandon Crawford was going to be the answer to the Giants hitting woes last year.
DeleteAnd yes, the Giants would have won the World Series in 2002 with the pitching they had in 2010. In fact, they beat a better hitting and pitching team in 2010 than the 2002 Angels.
And just out of curiosity, who exactly are this HR hitters you think the Giants should be acquiring?
DeleteI'm with you here, Doc. There's nothing really to get, that isn't a dog with fleas. Lind. We've got dance with who brought us. Powerwise: Hope for Belt to bring it up a notch. Pablo to come back. Posey to get back his power stroke. Nate to step up and start living up to his potential. Not even going to mention the 4-letter word. (alright, that's too vague: Huff)
DeleteI'm sure cards fans are saying it was pitching that lost the game, not the bums' overpowering offense that won it. Ditto for us. An added three-run homer still would have resulted in a loss. But a lock-down Timmy could have turned a 2-run lead into a win. Pitching wins. Even ask dodger fans. There's a reason for their resurgence.
ReplyDeleteLucky
Anonymous,clearly you and your Dr.G buddy speak English,my question is,do you understand it?To quote Bill Shatner,"Get A Life".
ReplyDeleteI think this is a lot more complicated situation than face value. It isn't like Timmy is being battered continually every inning or two. Earlier in the year, he would bomb in the 1st inning and then police himself up and go for another 5 or 6 innings. Just a few starts ago he went 8 innings giving up just 3 hits. The last couple starts has been that 4th inning. I can't help but believe that there are some personal problems or ADD or something else Timmy is having to face. Today, he struck out 5 of the first 6 batters he faced. It seems almost like he can't handle adversity like he used to. That 4 run inning did start out unlucky on Timmy's behalf. Maybe his psyche is out to a prolonged lunch. Maybe he lost too much weight too fast.
ReplyDeleteDrB, Just as the Dodgers are been lucky right now to you, the Giants were lucky in 2010. How can a washed up Pat Burrell who couldn't hit a HR to save his life in TB came to hit 18 dingers in less than half a season, we got a career year from nobody Torres (soon to be released by Mets, batting .200) and Huff who was also washed up, Renteria and Ross hitting the best pichers in baseball in the NLCS and WS? That is just simply lucky.
ReplyDeleteForgot to mention the game that Brooks Conrad won for us.
So am just saying no hate against the Dodgers, there are playing good baseball right now and if we start saying that there lucky, they might as well say the samething about 2010.
Agree with your comments on Lincecum. He ain't coming back no more, not as an elite pitcher. Maybe a 3.40-3.70 ERA. He's not fooling anybody with his stuff right now in the bigs, not even Oakland hitters.
I spoke to my good friend, scout Kendall Rogers who had this to say about Timmy: Lincecum struggles got nothing to do with mental, it might be more of wear and tear since Lincecum has thrown over 1500 IP since HS without getting injured or breaking down. They should rest him for a couple of starts and then give him an IP count for the rest year. They also said the Giants are very aggressive with their young pitchers in allowing them to pitch 200+ IP from the begining of their MLB careers. As well suggested the stress the Giants pitchers face in close games, the body – mentally and physically suffer greatly, it might have taking a ton on Lincecum.
I have never said that luck did not play a role in the Giants 2010 season. Almost every team that wins the WS has some luck going for them. I've also never said the Dodgers were not a good team. In fact, I've repeatedly said they are for real and should not be counted on to regress. They are a good team, but right now everything is breaking their way which means it might be their year. You have to have a good team in the first place in order to take advantage of your lucky breaks. I mean, the Padres could have all the luck in the world and we'd never know it because they are such a bad team.
DeleteTimmy's decline in velocity is definitely a factor as well as hitters adjusting to the splitter. Just from watching him though, I have to say there is likely a mental factor in play also.
The flip side is that we wouldn't have won that game if our pitching didn't keep us there in position to win it. A win is a win.
DeleteOtherwise, you denigrate 107 years of World Series championships, because there will always be an element of luck, no matter where you look, whether in the playoffs or during the season.
I'm no scout, but the way I see is that if he's injured or breaking down, or not an elite, pitcher, he wouldn't look dominant for a while until he has one disaster inning. That's mental to me, physical would mean that he's rarely dominant and in trouble constantly.
DeleteLots of people disagree with what the Giants do with their pitchers. Not that it's the same, but a lot of people disagreed with what the Braves and Mazzone were doing with their pitchers, as well. And the history of baseball is that there are pitchers who can handle 200+ IP and still have a long career. The Giants and Braves (and now the Rangers) believe that they know how to handle pitchers properly for long term careers.
It is just today there is a tyranny of CYA usage of pitchers where an arbitrary line - 100 pitches - is the be all and end all of how much effort the pitcher put into his start, irrespective of how often he was in trouble and how well he was throwing still at the end of the game. As Bill James noted in his book on pitchers, there is a lot of nuance to the handling of pitchers, nuance that the arbitrary 100 pitches ignores.
And nothing against your friend, but "might be more of wear and tear" also means "might not be more of wear and tear" as well. It is not very definitive. BP has been talking about how Lincecum and Cain are far beyond what they recommend on pitch count usage, with their scoring system having them far beyond other pitchers, and yet many seasons later, both are still pitching with no injuries so far. Cain not only has pitched more innings, but better, as his career has progressed.
And stress exists for any pitcher, the Giants deal with poor offense, but most of the people saying this don't note that the other team's pitchers deal with the fact that they aren't as good as the Giants pitchers, and thus while their teams score more, the pitchers also give up more, and thus are under similar stresses as the Giants pitchers.
And as far as I see it, there is less stress on the Giants pitchers than these other pitchers because they are so good that they expect to have a good game, it is expected, because they throw a large percentage of dominant PQS starts (the staff AS A WHOLE, regularly throw quality starts), while the other pitchers know that they have to be better in order to give their teams a chance of winning. It is more stressful to me, knowing that you have to be your best - which is not very often for other pitchers - in order for your team to have a good chance to win, whereas the Giants pitchers regularly throw good games (80-90% of the time), so it is not as big a deal to them to throw well, it is something they do as a normal course of pitching.
Sorry DrB, missunderstood your comment about the Dodgers. My apologies.
ReplyDeleteTimmy,
ReplyDeleteThe psychical. By his admission Timmy has had major weight gains and losses in the last two years.
2010 never worked out, lost stamina and control in August, started working out and never looked back.
2011 big weight gain on In-N-Out diet. Pitched heavier, but stamina still an issue. But junk food in, junk results out. Post season ballooned up to 197 pounds.
2012 took up swimming and knocked off 25-30 pounds. Timmy looks skinny again.
Has all this weight gain, crappy diet, swimming (for baseball?) added up to a different and/or less reliable body. I mention different because Timmy's pitching motion is highly refined and complex - and perhaps it is been impacted by all these body changes. Note these are not minor changes, but major changes; 30+ pounds, massive junk diet, totally different exercise programs, plus just plain aging. In addition, Timmy has had 200+ innings of MLB pitcher wear and tear for four straight years.
I am not in the camp that says Timmy is too small, or weak, or has a weird pitching motion. His pitching motion is a thing of rare athletic beauty and remember he doesn't need to ice after games.
Timmy has, however, been playing with fire by changing his body mass, diet and exercise program in such major ways. Maybe this is catching up with him?
Monterey Shark - you post as Chato's Land on lefty's! Hey, it only takes me a little while here and there to put 2 and 2 together. Like Homer Simpson. Hey, that's not the wallet inspector.
DeleteAnyways, nicely said, I think the weight and conditioning have a major impact on his delivery.
Yeah, I save more of my SF snark for Lefty's and keep it cleaner here at DocB's place. All in good fun.
DeleteAnd yes, I am wondering about Timmy's psychical condition and the major changes he has put himself through. It is much harder to speak to his mental condition. However, he keeps alluding to that in his interviews, so maybe there is something to that as well.
I am thinking more and more that it's mental and not physical. As many have noted, it is not like he's lost all the time, which would signify a physical issue, but one moment he would be dominant, and the next not so. All the interviews and comments from Timmy talk to a profile similar to Zito and others with this Jeckyll-Hyde performances: the Thinker.
DeleteNot that I was ever all that great, but I was decent until the pressure was on, when I became Herman Munster on the playing field. That's why I really buy into the article by Malcom Gladwell on athletes' mental state in times of pressure, talking about the art of failure: http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.htm
I think that Lincecum starts thinking when runners get on, and it is just a bad mental spiral downward once you get into that bad habit. The Giants have had a long history of pitchers who would be undone by one bad inning when the runners come running home in crooked numbers.
I was wondering if it was his contract this off-season that triggered it, much like it did with Zito. Biggest ever contract by whatever metric it was. While winning the Cy Young is pressure, that's like post-pressure plus with the first one, there were still the doubters. It helps to play with a chip on your shoulder. But the contract puts a different pressure on that starts with the season.
And he never had the mental toughness that Cain has shown, though that is only bad in comparison to a real tough guy. Lincecum at least would recover from his jitters due to first type of starts (where he would be un-timmeh-like) with a good start afterward. And he came through for us great in the 2010 playoffs, so it is not like he's been bad overall, just that he does have this tendency once in a while, of thinking too much when the pressure is on.
I'm hoping that getting bowled over that A's player is what kicks his behind and get himself over the contract and just keeping it simple and stupid, as he put it. Bochy's pointed comments are also prods, this is around the time that he brings out the cattle prods to players who had been scuffling since the start and hadn't kicked things into the gear the Giants expected. Timmy needs the chip on his back, the one that said he was too small, too whatever, to do what he does, and start taking no prisoners. He's too good a player not to figure it out, but it could be a while before we see the Timmy we know and love.
And it is my opinion that once he gets over this mental kerfluffle, he'll be back to normal and be like the guy we love and expect. The question for me is how much longer. I'm hoping, obviously, the knock down gets him going, that's a pretty bad image of him, knocked down, going around.
Someone noted the Giants are 2-7 in Lincecum starts. That means that they are 19-13 in other games. While his 17-16 last season was the team's fault, his 2-7 is mostly his fault. The team has scored 4 or more runs in 5 of those games. If he had won all those games, the Giants would have been 5-4 in his starts and the team would be 24-17, 4 games behind. He also won a 2 run game, so that would put the Giants at 6-3, and then only 3 games behind LAD. And when the team is better offensively relative to the league, as they are this season, he was 21-12 in 2008, 19-13 in 2009, and 21-12 in 2010. Which would put the team roughly at 6-3 in those seasons. things would not look as dire had Tim been pitching like he's capable of doing.
Even if his struggles are mostly mental it is still concerning that his average fastball velocity is down close to 2.5 mph. I don't think we can expect him to start dominating all of the sudden ala September 2010 if his fastball velocity continues to hover around 89 mph. I'd like to see an increase of at least 1 to 1.5 mph on his average fastball. I think conditioning and mechanical adjustments could play a part in that happening, although conditioning is something that he probably can't fix in-season.
DeleteMaybe Timmy's just feeling the pressure of being paid $20+ million for the next 2 years. He said so himself that he didn't like the idea of signing a long term deal (his agent's been pushing 7-8 years, possibly because he knows it won't happen and it allows Tim to keep going on short term deals) because he didn't want to have to try to live up to it. He's probably thinking too hard and just not letting his body and mechanics do the work.
ReplyDelete