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Maybe things will change when the Giants reach Milwaukee this weekend, but San Francisco's first few games were painful to watch. There is little punch in the offense, the Giants stumbled around defensively on opening day in Los Angeles with second baseman Ray Durham muffing an infield pop-up and center fielder Aaron Rowand missing cutoff men and misplaying a hop that allowed Dodgers runners to take an extra base, and the Barry Zito thing is getting harder and harder to look at.
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| Barry Zito gave up four runs on eight hits during Monday's start. (AP) |
And perhaps Harley-Davidson will start earning most of its money by producing tricycles.
It wasn't the surrendering of four runs on eight hits in five innings that was so bad on Monday in Dodger Stadium, it was in the fact that it was more of the same for Zito, who has never looked so far removed from his ace days in Oakland.
His fastball was pedestrian, mostly clocking in at 82-83 mph. (he touched 84). His curve was mostly a memory of what once was a dominant weapon. He only struck out four batters in 18 1/3 innings this spring while compiling a 10.31 ERA and, on Monday in Dodger Stadium, Los Angeles hitters swung and missed at exactly one of his first 60 pitches.
The Giants, from pitching coach Dave Righetti to Zito himself, mostly are fresh out of answers.
Zito said this spring that he was "tinkering" with mechanical issues, mostly involving timing issues during his windup and delivery. He told me during one conversation that he did let the monster contract affect him last summer as he was looking overmatched and going 11-13 with a 4.53 ERA.
"After three or four months of doing that, I started to focus on the right things instead of external things," Zito said. "Things got better my last 10 starts."
He was 2-1 with a 2.50 in seven August starts -- his best month by far in 2007 -- and finished with a 4.25 ERA in September.
"I let the team down a lot of times," Zito said. "I wanted to pitch better for management. It's a learning curve."
Scouts who watched Zito this spring saw what looked to be a continuing decline for the 29-year-old lefty, though the thinking was Arizona air isn't friendly to Cactus League pitchers -- particularly to those who throw curve balls.
It's early, and it's dangerous to make severe judgments on one day, but based on Monday, the Giants remain on high alert where it comes to Zito.
"The thing I saw was not so much that he lacked fastball velocity, because it's so early in the season and he could still get up to 85 to 88 as the season goes along, but I saw him having trouble repeating his curve," said one scout who watched Monday's game. "He used to have that snap-dragon curveball, but he couldn't throw it. He'd throw one good one, and then three bad ones.
