SAN FRANCISCO — If we didn’t have a clear frontrunner for the National League Cy Young award before Monday afternoon, we do now.
Hint: It isn’t Tim Lincecum.
Lincecum hooked up with Ubaldo Jimenez at AT&T Park in the most hyped pitching matchup of the season in Major League Baseball. In the end, it wasn’t even close.
U the Man, Ubaldo.
Jimenez pitched a complete game four-hitter as the Rockies beat the San Francisco Giants 4-0 on a sun-splashed Memorial Day on the Bay. One Giants runner reached third base and only three reached second.
Any more questions?
Where do we begin in describing Jimenez’s dominance in 2010? He has thrown 26 consecutive scoreless innings, a franchise record for a starting pitcher. And who held the old record? Jimenez, who had a streak of 25 1/3 earlier in the season.
Jimenez is 10-1 with a 0.78 ERA. One more win and he would tie the franchise record of 11 wins by the all-star break.
Lincecum? He didn’t pitch like a back-to-back Cy Young winner. He allowed four runs, three earned, in 5 2/3 innings. Now for the numbers that told the story of the day: Lincecum threw 121 pitches. Jimenez by the time he reached the 5 2/3-inning mark had thrown 82.
“How many runs do you actually need to win today?” Rockies manager Jim Tracy wondered aloud before the game. “If both guys live up to who they are, we’re talking just a knock ’em down, drag ’em out Who knows? Is it 3-2, 2-1, 1-0?
“I know full well walking in here today that I’m surrounding our starting pitcher with the best defense I can surround him with and let him do his thing. If we get a point or two, there have been a lot of games I’ve watched this man pitch already this year where that’s all he needed.”
The Rockies got him the only runs he needed on Clint Barmes” two-out, two-run single up the middle in the second inning. Todd Helton followed with a two-run double in the fifth before a wild pickoff throw by reliever Dan Runzler completed the scoring in sixth.
Jim Armstrong: 303-954-1269 or jmarmstrong@denverpost.com.
