By Jonah Keri at
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It's April 12, so you know what that means: Time to freak out over the demise of Tim Lincecum!
It was a year ago to the day that I filed a dispatch from Coors Field on Lincecum's terrible outing against the Rockies. Lincecum got shelled for six runs on eight hits that night, failing to make it out of the third inning. But that was only his second start of the season, at mile-high altitude, no less. We had years of evidence that Lincecum was not only a terrific pitcher, but also an oft-doubted one, his small build and explosive, catapult-like delivery prompting many predictions that his success would be short-lived. Yet time after time, whenever a couple of bad games would trigger headlines that read, "What's Wrong with Tim Lincecum?" the answer was always the same: Nothing, dummy.
We can't say that anymore. Lincecum's slow start last year finally did mean something, as the lanky righty put up the worst numbers of his career. By the time the Giants reached the 2012 playoffs, they elected to send their two-time Cy Young Award winner to the bullpen, figuring he — like virtually any other starting pitcher — would perform better if able to let loose for short spurts rather than trying to negotiate seven or eight innings a start. Turns out they were right: Lincecum plowed through opposing lineups throughout the postseason, including 4⅔ hitless innings during the World Series, which helped propel the Giants to a four-game sweep over Detroit. Lacking the luxury afforded by the postseason's four-man rotations, the organizational depth to move someone else into Lincecum's slot, and the dissonance to relegate a $22 million pitcher to the bullpen, the Giants plopped him right back into the rotation to start this season … and he's been lousy again. You can't trust the numbers after two starts; you can after an entire season, plus two starts.
So now we can ask the question earnestly: What's wrong with Tim Lincecum?
By Hua Hsu at
Mark Cunningham/MLB Photos/Getty Images
I spent Game 5 of the 2010 World Series lying on the floor of my apartment, staring at the ceiling and listening to the San Francisco Giants’ local radio feed over the Internet. I was 3,000 miles away from the Bay Area and I wanted some connection to the feelings and rituals of childhood. I had first become a fan via the radio and all that it leaves to the imagination. If this was going to happen, I wanted to hear some familiar voices narrate the scene. As the Giants poured onto the field after the final out, longtime play-by-play man Duane Kuiper reflected on what the moment meant: “You can’t help but think that this group is celebrating for the Say Hey Kid ... for Will the Thrill ... celebrating for number 25 and celebrating for all you Giants fans, wherever you are.”
Here are the most compelling matchups, stories, and personalities in Major League Baseball for the coming weekend.
The extended All-Star break is officially the worst development in American sports. What am I supposed to do with my life? Actually go outside? No thanks. The only time I want to go outside is if there's an outdoor TV showing baseball. And even then, why not bring the TV inside where there are chips? Baseball players are selfish and should be forced to play tripleheaders for the rest of the season.
Here are the most compelling matchups, stories, and personalities in Major League Baseball for the coming weekend.
10. Zack Greinke's Chance for a Classic F-You Game (Saturday, MIL-HOU)
Let me make my case for Zack Greinke as an All-Star. Bear with me, because I'm going to use a revolutionary stat-comparison technique, where I take certain key stats of Greinke's and match them up against the rest of Major League Baseball. So, compared to every other qualified pitcher in the game, Greinke is: Second in FIP. Second in WAR. Hell, how about we just stop there? By two of the most reliable overall pitching metrics, he's the second best pitcher in baseball. Good enough, right? No? Does the All-Star Game just have one pitcher now? They're only inviting Justin Verlander? Ah, you need more convincing? OK: Ninth in HR/FB rate. Third-lowest HR/9 rate. Top 20 walk rate. Top 20 strikeout rate. Top 20 fastball, top 10 two-seam fastball, enough.
The concept of buying low in fantasy can be a tricky one to navigate. Whether or not you're truly buying low can depend on the size of your league, and how savvy your competitors are. You might have free-agent budgets to consider, or an intransigent owner who won't trade the guy you want, even with a strong offer.
Best we can do is dig up a few players having regrettable seasons, factor in their reputations, then sort them by three categories: buy low, buy lower, and buy lowest. Think of the buy-low players as waiver pickups or trade possibilities in standard (12-team) mixed leagues, on down to target guys in 20-team mixed, or AL-/NL-only leagues.
In case you were out living a life of leisure, here's what you missed in sports on Wednesday.
Tim Lincecum struck out eight over seven scoreless innings to earn his first win in two months and give the Giants their third straight shutout against the Dodgers, propelling them into a tie for first place in the NL West. The 3-0 win was such a relief for Lincecum that he shook his head around dramatically in the shower, eyes closed, wet hair flying everywhere, clearly pretending he was in a triumphant sports movie. Players nearby reported that he could be heard singing the words to Styx's "Show Me the Way," which everyone thought was pretty much a perfect choice for that scene.
When Voros McCracken wrote his seminal piece on pitching and defense 11 years ago, he helped change the way people — fans, writers, even general managers — think about run prevention in baseball. Where once we used to throw most of the blame for a hit on the pitcher who gave it up, McCracken helped us realize that a slew of other factors go into whether a ball hit into play falls for a hit. For many people in the game and others who simply watch it, our ability to recognize the influence of defense, park effects, and dumb luck can be traced back to that one little article.
Today, we have multiple stats that can help us better understand a pitcher's influence on the game. Fair Run Average (FRA), Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP), and Expected Fielding Independent Pitching (xFIP) all attempt to parse the events a pitcher best controls from those over which he has the least control. The fantasy implications seem obvious. If a pitcher, say, posts a much higher ERA than xFIP for a few weeks or a few months, we might expect luck to start working in his favor in the future, and for his ERA (and other fantasy stats) to start improving. If he puts up a much lower ERA than xFIP, you could argue that his good fortune might be due to run out soon.
No matter how hard you study, no matter how hard you try to manage risk, there's a good chance you're going to badly overdraft at least one player. Even the best of us end up with first-rounders who perform like 15th-rounders. What's important is figuring out what to do once you've made that kind of mistake, then learning a lesson for the future.
So you can call this a venting session, and a teachable moment. Here are 10 of this year's biggest Fantasy Murderers.
Six innings, five runs, eight hits. For Tim Lincecum and his now-10.54 ERA, that qualifies as an improvement. The guy who might've been the best pitcher on the planet three years ago now makes his fantasy owners cower in terror before checking his box scores.
Which is exactly why you should be targeting him. For all the hand-wringing over Lincecum's lower velocity, the fact is he's been a low-90s fastball guy for years now. He's striking out more than a batter an inning, with four times as many Ks and walks, and a slow start that might be nothing more than some very curable location issues.
But the biggest reason for optimism boils down to a simple history lesson. Baseball's past is littered with tales of players who stunk to start the season, even carrying their struggles all the way through April. Not only did many of those players turn things around after rough starts … some of those ugly beginnings ended in greatness. MVP and Cy Young greatness.
In case you were out living a life of leisure, here's what you missed in sports on Monday.
Bobby Valentine apologized to Kevin Youkilis a day after questioning his physical and emotional commitment to the team. Youkilis sat out with a groin injury as the Sox fell to James Shields (8 1/3 innings, 4 hits, 0 runs) and the Rays 1-0. Despite the apology, Valentine's original point about physical commitment seemed to hold true after the game, when Youkilis was spotted doing his famous "groin dance" for a group of female fans.
That's the question some freaked-out Giants fans were left asking after Wednesday night's debacle at Coors Field. Lincecum surrendered six runs on eight hits, didn't make it out of the third inning, and started a chain reaction that ended in a 17-8 annihilation by the Rockies. Two shaky starts into the season, sitting on a 12.91 ERA, maybe this would be the year he'd finally lose it.
In case you were out living a life of leisure, here's what you missed in sports on Tuesday.
A source reported that the Detroit Tigers have agreed to a nine-year, $214 million deal with former Brewers slugger Prince Fielder. The hefty contract was a bitter pill to swallow for Tigers third baseman Brandon Inge, who is currently being paid in worthless foreclosed Detroit homes.
In case you were out living a young person's life of leisure, here's what you missed in sports on Tuesday.
This morning we're counting down the ten most significant moments of Tuesday night. They could be great, they could be awful, or they could be "other," but the ranking is entirely dependent on their importance. Kind of like how Time magazine's Person of the Year can be Gandhi, Hitler, or Mark Zuckerberg.
