Well, I guess Tim Lincecum has at least been consistent. Unfortunately, that has shown itself in the reigning Cy Young winner walking five batters in every one of the last four starts, tying his career high. That’s a total of 20 in just 23.1 innings, and is an aberration - Lincecum has had more five-walk games since May 15, than he did over the entire 2008 and 2009 seasons combined.
Tim Lincecum To Batters: ‘Walk This Way’
It’s a large factor in why he has a 5.79 ERA over that time. Of course, his number over the entire season is still a very respectable 3.14, but that’s still the highest it has been on this date since his rookie year; in his Cy Young winning campaigns of 2008 and 2009, the respective number was 2.23 and 3.01. And the trend of late has not been good.
Said Lincecum recently:
"When I first came up, they'd try to make me throw pitches, eliminate pitches. Then it went the other way. I've thrown strikes and had them on the defensive. And now, it's flipped back around. It's like back to my first year again."
It also doesn’t help that Linecum has been falling behind in the count more often. Prior to this year, he had been right at MLB average of 58% for throwing a first-pitch strike. In 2010, that number has dropped to 51%. I also note that the gap in speed between his fastball and his change-up [which was devastating last season] has also narrowed. In 2009, the average difference was 9.2 mph; this season, it’s 7.2 mph.
This is not to say that he is chopped liver, of course; no team looks forward to facing a two-time reigning Cy Young winner, as Pittsburgh will have to do on Sunday. But the recent struggles, coupled with the apparently irresistible rise of Ubaldo Jimenez, seem to have significantly lengthened the odds against him three-peating.
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