'Good outing' is relative

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz.- Barry Zito started against the Mariners on Saturday and gave up seven runs in 5 innings. Consider that a good outing.

Sure that sounds weird. Seven runs — all earned — is not usually a good outing. Also not good is when the starter loads the bases in the first inning and gives up a grand slam before the national anthem has stopped reverberating through the thin desert air. Kenji Johjima hit the grand slam on a 2-0 count, and afterward Zito said: “It was 2-0. Everyone in the park knows a heater’s coming. Lesson: Just don’t go 2-0.”

That’s one lesson. Another is Zito can’t throw his fastball past batters when he has to. And yet, it was a good outing.

“He’s on track,” pitching coach Dave Righetti said afterward. “He’s getting his arm strength. It was a good outing.”

I agree. It was good. I swear it was. But why was it good? Because Zito came into the game with an earned-run average of 17.18. That’s not an ERA. That’s a condition. And he came into the game tinkering with his windup, this from the former Cy Young Award winner, this from the Giants’ opening-day starter, this from the $126 million man.

Question: Did Juan Marichal experiment with a new windup in spring? Did Sandy Koufax? Not likely. Zito is a confused young man, and I still insist he did a good job.

He did a good job even though he’s the subject of a game. All over Arizona, people are playing “What’s wrong with Barry?” Casual fans play the game and scouts play it and baseball insiders play it. I’ve heard them play it.

The answers are creative and fascinating. A common answer is the money. People inclined to the psychological approach, people who want to play shrink to Barry, say the $126 mil is a burden. How can any normal person, they wonder, stand up under the pressure, the other-worldly responsibility, of so much dough?

The answer, of course, is nobody put Zito into a headlock and forced him to take the money. One hundred and twenty-six big ones is no burden. I, for one, would like to face life with such a burden. Give me the burden. If Zito can’t handle it, he should have been an ice cream man.

Another answer is the Appeal to Rick Peterson. I’m serious about this, so pay attention. One prevailing Barry theory is that he leaned on former A’s pitching coach Rick Peterson — now with the Mets. Peterson, kind of flaky himself, understood a flake like Zito and made him feel grounded. Without Peterson, Zito is lost, puzzled, floating. This is no knock on Righetti. It’s just that Zito never has experienced success with him.

Another answer is that Zito has lost speed on his fastball. There’s no answer explaining why he lost the speed, but let’s set that troubling issue aside. He used to throw the heater about 90 mph and now he throws the luke-warmer 84 or 85. The result? His change-up isn’t much different from his fastball, which means he has trouble fooling batters.

A related answer is that his fastball is fast enough but doesn’t move. This is a subtle theory but it’s worth pondering. Future Hall of Famer Greg Maddux doesn’t throw so fast, either, and never did. But his ball moves in the strike zone, and batters have trouble nailing him. Zito’s ball is straight, doesn’t wiggle or do the hula or whatever balls are supposed to do, and batters definitely nail him. The Mariners hit two homers off him Saturday, big whoppers, clear examples of nailing.

This is what I know. The Giants’ investors are in town this weekend. Saturday’s game was on TV. Zito needed to do OK, even if spring games don’t count and pitchers always say they don’t care about results because “I was just getting my work in.” Which is what Zito said after the game.

Zito definitely needed to do OK for everyone’s peace of mind, and after the first inning he did, kind of. He went three straightinnings without giving up a run, and he established a rhythm, took less time between pitches, and he had the Mariners off balance. And mostly he seemed like a man who knows his business even though, get this, he has not struck out a single batter this spring.

Sure, he gave up two runs in the top of the fifth and he gave up a homer in the top of the sixth before manager Bruce Bochy yanked him.

But I’m not counting the fifth and sixth against Zito. I’ve always been an easy grader and I figure he was getting tired, this being March. I give him credit for the scoreless second, third and fourth, and I’m sticking to that.

I’m also sticking to this. Zito can be a good pitcher for the Giants, should be. It’s just that he’s being paid like an ace — baseball insiders call an ace a “one.”

Never again will he be a one. He can be a good three or a four. That’s what insiders say. I thought you should know.

You can reach Staff Columnist Lowell Cohn at 521-5486 or lowell.cohn@pressdemocrat.com.