It might take Matt Cain a few weeks to rev up his multimillion-dollar fastball. As for giving a teammate grief, he is game-ready now.
Told Friday that Tim Lincecum hopes to add a new pitch in 2008, Cain said, "What's he adding, a gyroball?" Actually, Lincecum wants to unveil a hard slider, to which Cain said, "Does he not know his curveball is hard?"
People are free to ask Lincecum about his slider during his Q&A session at today's FanFest. Someone definitely needs to ask how he expects to look older than 18 with his circa-1964 Beatles mop-top 'do.
That Lincecum will appear at FanFest today and report to Giants spring training in Scottsdale, Ariz., on Wednesday is a significant development. He just as easily could have been going to Dunedin, Fla., where Toronto trains because the Giants had a firm offer in December to send him to the Blue Jays for All-Star outfielder Alex Rios.
After a week of playing "deal or no deal" in his mind, general manager Brian Sabean elected not to deal the 23-year-old right-hander, who won seven games and struck out 150 batters in 1461/3 innings as a rookie in 2007, one year after his first-round selection in the draft.
Lincecum's future was splayed in the media daily. Even if he did not spend hours scrolling through all the blogs and stories online, his friends did - and happily phoned Lincecum with every excruciating detail. His college catcher from Washington, now a Blue Jays minor-leaguer, called to say how cool it would be for them to reunite.
It was not fun for Lincecum.
"I'm sitting here, and I just got to this team, and already I might be leaving," he said. "That was kind of the one part that was a little nerve-wracking, just changing location. I'd be going from living semi-close to home to living above Chicago in Toronto. It would be totally different."
Lincecum got to breathe again when Sabean declared him off-limits to other teams. Thus, Giants fans again will see that outstanding fastball, tantalizing curveball, emerging changeup and, yes, a hard slider that he began messing with in the bullpen late last year. He said he threw a slurvy slider in college but likes the idea of adding this pitch, which looks more like a cut fastball.
"The changeup became a go-to pitch for me when I needed it," Lincecum said. "It wasn't great early on, but it's definitely a pitch I'm more comfortable with. I want to be able to find that with my slider. If it only takes a couple of starts or bullpen (sessions) to get that slider going, that's it. I want to throw four pitches."
Young and old: The Giants do plan to give their younger position players a chance to win jobs, but the competitions might not be equal. Daniel Ortmeier will get a significant opportunity to win the first-base job and Kevin Frandsen is expected to garner a bigger role at second or third base, but manager Bruce Bochy said 35-year-old Dave Roberts will go into camp as the "frontrunner" for the left-field job.
Roberts might share a platoon with Rajai Davis. Still, Sabean admitted it could be tough to find enough playing time for Davis, Fred Lewis and Nate Schierholtz in an outfield that features Aaron Rowand and Randy Winn, who last year played in 161 and 155 games, respectively.
"Frankly, I'm a little bit worried about it, because it's going to be a challenge to mix and match in there, especially from the standpoint of knowing that Rowand and Winn are going to be out there a lot, and we hope Dave comes back to form," Sabean said.
"But you're going to have to find a way to get (the younger) guys in there. I'd hate like hell to be in a position to send any one of them back to the minor leagues, because I don't think any one of them has anything to prove down there and they don't deserve to be down there."
Briefly:
The Giants have signed all their
arbitration-eligible players, finishing Friday by agreeing to a one-year, $1.075 million deal with pitcher Kevin Correia. ... Fans should not expect to frolic in the grass at FanFest, mainly because there is none. Most of the field remains covered in dirt following last month's motocross event.
Kevin Correia
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