Dorks And Losers

The San Fran­cisco Giants have a very highly touted rota­tion of 2008 Cy Young Tim Lince­cum, Matt Cain, Randy John­son, Barry Zito, and Jonathan Sanchez.

The Giants were a sur­prise in 2007 end­ing up with a 72–90 when many thought that the team was guar­an­teed to lose a hun­dred games. A lot of the team’s suc­cess was attrib­uted to the awe­some­ness of Tim Lince­cum and his .783 win percentage.

Matt Cain’s record should have been a lot bet­ter, and there’s no doubt that his 8–14 was no indica­tive of his tal­ent con­sid­er­ing his 3.76 ERA and almost eight strike­outs a game. Jonathan Sanchez showed flashes of bril­liance in June, which almost imme­di­ately started chants of San Francisco’s ver­sion of the Oak­land Ath­let­ics early 2000’s Big Three.

But Sanchez seems to be a four-to-five inning pitcher that might make him a relief pitcher (set-up or closer) sooner than later if he can’t “get it together.”

For all the crap that Barry Zito gets for sign­ing the mam­moth con­tract he did, it should be worth not­ing that Zito did improve upon his dis­as­trous 2007 sea­son. His num­bers don’t show it (11–13, 4.53 ERA in 2007 ver­sus 10–17, 5.15 ERA in 2008), Zito was more relaxed and attempted to adapt his pitch­ing style to be more successful.

The real­ity for 2008 is that no one expects much from Zito in 2009. You can pretty much pen­cil in 10 wins and a 4.50 ERA. He would be key to the team’s suc­cess because any improve­ment would be super ben­e­fi­cial. You can pretty much lock in Lince­cum, Cain, and John­son to have pretty solid years. If Zito were to pro­duce, he wouldn’t be a “lock” to be just a fourth starter nor would he drag the team’s morale by stress­ing the offense and bullpen.

The team’s offense is already pretty ane­mic, espe­cially with many more sea­soned rook­ies in the lineup so it will be up to the team’s pitch­ing (hope­fully with a less chaotic Brian Wil­son as closer) to bridge the gap.

[photo via Scott Able­man]

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