Lincecum gets fresh start with Angels
Ex- Giant seeks return to heights he hit for Giants
He has brought his long stride to a club that needs a whole marching band.
Tim Lincecum, one of the most spectacular and distinctive pitchers of the previous decade, is pitching for the Los Angeles Angels.
They needed starters when Garrett Richards and Andrew Heaney got injured and when Tyler Skaggs couldn’t respond from Tommy John elbow surgery. Most clubs have pitchers-inwaiting when stuff like that happens. The Angels didn’t, so they signed Lincecum, who had been involuntarily waiting long enough, for one year at $2.5 million.
The 2008 and 2009 National League Cy Young Award winner had hip surgery in September and was no longer a member of the San Francisco Giants. They had drafted Lincecum 10th overall in 2006 when many scouts watched his homegrown motion and wondered how he could pinwheel his way through a big-league season without disintegration.
Lincecum auditioned for several teams in Arizona, after a winter of near-seclusion, and the Angels signed him in May. After three abbreviated minor league starts, he was promoted.
A supportive crowd of 36,412 showed up June 23 for his first home start. The people playing behind Lincecum weren’t as kind. A single through a shift and errors by Mike Trout and Yunel Escobar helped remove Lincecum after three innings and 83 pitches. To be fair, so did a three-run homer by the Oakland Athletics’ Marcus Semien and Lincecum’s inability to throw a first strike to 10 of the 18 A’s he faced.
His actual debut (June 18) was more encouraging. Pitching in Oakland and luring some old fans across the Bay Bridge, Lincecum threw 98 pitches in six innings, giving up four hits in a 7-1 win. He said he was surprised at the emo- tions he felt, but then he flashed back a couple of months, when he fidgeted at home while his peers were playing exhibition games.
“I was nervous when I didn’t break camp with a team, nervous when I didn’t start the spring,” Lincecum said, between his second and third starts. “It’s a little bit of uncertainty. It’s what the process is all about. I’ve had to embrace the difference. I had to get through rehab the right way, then set my focus a little more, try to work harder and smarter.”
Lincecum is 32. The uniform doesn’t hang on his frame quite like it did, but if anything he looks stronger. His hair is shorn, not long and free-flowing as in his Giants prime, and he blends into the crowd of red jerseys during stretching. The Angels hope he sets himself apart, as an example of professionalism and dedication, although they don’t have many top prospects for Lincecum to impress. There is also the possibility that Lincecum will reel back enough years to make himself a trade-deadline commodity.
From 2008 to 2011, Lincecum was the majors’ leading bat-misser. He went 62-36, led the National League in strikeouts three consecutive years and won the Cy Young in his first two full seasons.
Lincecum threw eight com- plete games in that span and did not miss a start until 2014, and that was because of performance.
“We played them up there one night,” Angels manager Mike Scioscia says, referring to a 2009 Lincecum start. “We somehow pulled out that game, but I remember how tough he was. Not that he was a max-effort guy all the time, but I don’t remember seeing a guy who threw that hard and went all-out like that and still had that great command. You throw in the changeup, and you knew you were dealing with somebody special.”
“I never saw a guy get every bit of energy out of his body like he did,” says Mark Gubicza, a distinguished major league pitcher who is the Angels’ TV analyst. “I pitched with Kevin Appier in Kansas City, and Lincecum had that same type of deception. The ball was there before you were ready. He’ll add a lot here, because people will see how he goes about it. His competitiveness always stood out.”
At 5-11, Lincecum has made the world safer for shorter pitchers with unique motions. He was taught by his father, Chris, a Boeing engineer in Bellevue, Wash. What didn’t look smooth to some scouts looked very sound biomechanically to Chris, with an emphasis on a long stride, fast body movement and maximum torque. But Lincecum was so dominant at the University of Washington that he made himself a no-brainer first-round pick. Giants executive Dick Tidrow, a renowned pitching decoder, gave it his blessing.
Now you see Marcus Stroman, Toronto’s 5-8 righty, with a 20-10 record in 40 career starts.
“There were guys paving the way for me before my feet even got closer to the field,” Lincecum says. “The likes of Tim Hudson, Jake Peavy, Ian Kennedy, obviously Pedro Martinez, even Johan Santana. ... You’ll find players throughout history who fit those molds. They get shaped as the exception as opposed to the norm.
“My dad has been stressed by all this (injury). Just like any parent, he worries about the stuff the kids don’t worry about for themselves. He’s been my biggest advocate and my biggest critic. Maybe he hasn’t always worn that in the greatest way, but I wouldn’t change it for anything. I’m so grateful to be on his team, grateful that he helped me get through this process.”
Lincecum began to lose velocity in 2012, when his ERA spiked from 2.74 to 5.18 and his home runs allowed went from 15 to 23. But he still struck out 190 that season, more than one per inning. The beast fully returned during the World Series, when he faced 14 Detroit Tigers, struck out eight and retired them all as a reliever.
His Giants’ days ended last summer when his hip needed attention. But his historical value is unquestioned, as the Giant who replaced Barry Bonds as the lead singer and ticket-seller, and one of the best pitchers in franchise history.
“From top to bottom they have continuity,” Lincecum said. “The relationship between front office and players is second to none, from what I understood. They make it gradually easier for young players to be themselves in the clubhouse.
“The players police it when necessary. There is respect for the people who are above the players, and that was taught by the people who come through it.”
The way Lincecum quietly made the painful devolution from a “super-strikeout guy to a guy who relies on the contact and a lot of help from the bullpen” was part of that teaching process. If nothing else, the Angels can say Lincecum graced their mound in 2016. If he starts gracing it into the seventh or eighth inning, that’s a long stride, too.