DEL.ICIO.USBraves doomed by Giants’ pitching
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Turner Field felt like a stop on a Cy Young campaign tour for the Giants’ Tim Lincecum on Sunday.
In only his second season in the majors, the 24-year-old pitcher has ventured from the cover of Sports Illustrated to the All-Star game, and if he keeps pitching like he did in a 3-1 win over the Braves Sunday, some hardware will be next.
Ben Gray/bgray@ajc.com
Rookie Charlie Morton (3-7) remained winless in seven starts at Turner Field after giving up seven hits, three runs, two walks and six strikeouts in his first career appearance against the Giants.
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The lanky right-hander held the Braves to one run in 7-2/3 innings to lower his ERA to 2.60 and move ahead of the Padres’ Jake Peavy for the National League lead.
He beat the Braves for the second time in his past three starts to move to 13-3, while playing for a team that’s 19 games under .500. By striking out 10, he stretched his league-leading total to 192 strikeouts on the season.
“Today, his ball moved so much,” Braves manager Bobby Cox said. “He can throw it right at a lefty and it comes over the plate and hard. He’s one of the bright young pitchers in all of baseball.”
The Braves got a quality start on three days’ rest from Charlie Morton, but it wasn’t enough against a pitcher making his mark on the game only 50 outings into his career.
“If I could have held them to a run or two …” said Morton, who gave up three runs in six innings and fell to 3-7. “A guy like that who can give you eight shutout innings, you want to minimize it as much as you can. He’s up there with guys like [CC] Sabathia or [Brandon] Webb or [Roy] Halladay. He’s really good. You’ve got to be better than you are.”
Morton was better than he was in his last start — 2-1/3 innings in a loss to the Cubs — but a two-run homer by Travis Ishikawa in the second inning gave Lincecum the lead he needed. It was also Ishikawa’s first major-league homer.
Randy Winn tripled and scored another run in the fifth inning to make it 3-0.
“I’ve had it banged into my head for so long that I have good stuff,” said Morton, who fell to 0-6 with an 8.13 ERA in seven starts at Turner Field. “On any given day I can have four or five plus pitches. My problem is being aggressive. And my problem is being in the zone early and getting ahead and finishing hitters. And you do that by staying aggressive.”
Lincecum wasn’t as aggressive as he’d been in his start in San Francisco against the Braves on Aug. 6, Braves center fielder Mark Kotsay said, but that didn’t make it any easier.
“He was effectively wild today because his ball-to-strike ratio was almost 50-50,” Kotsay said. “When he throws an 82-mph slider and a 95-mph fastball on the black, it’s tough to get locked into the zone and be aggressive on a pitch.”
Lincecum walked four batters but allowed only three hits. Of his 119 pitches, 51 were for balls, 68 for strikes.
The Braves chased Lincecum with two outs in the eighth inning after Yunel Escbar walked and Chipper Jones singled.
Kotsay then singled in a run off reliever Jack Taschner. Closer Brian Wilson came on to face the pinch-hitting Brian McCann, and a wild pitch actually got him out of trouble. It moved runners to second and third, so the Giants walked McCann to bring up Jeff Francoeur with the bases loaded and two out.
Francoeur fell to 3-for-25 (.120) with the bases loaded this season when he bounced out to second base. Wilson got his 33rd save, tops in the National League.
“I thought we might do something with Wilson there but he’s throwing 97 to 100; he’s not easy,” Cox said. “They’ve got really good pitching, they’re just rebuilding their club on the field.”
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