It was really an immovable object/irresistible force kind of doubleheader. Doug Davis and Rodrigo Lopez have been terrible. Terrible. The Giants' offense has been terrible. Terrible. I had a fear that tonight's doubleheader was going to be sixteen hours of Giants hitters fouling pitches back to the screen. Oooh, just missed it. Ooooh, just missed it. Ooooh, just missed it.
Sixteen hours. I could taste it.
Instead, we know that there is a greater force of suck in the universe. It doesn't feel so cold in here now. The Giants can hit Doug Davis. The Giants can string a couple of hits together against Rodrigo Lopez. Hopefully if the Giants make the playoffs, those guys start games one and two of every playoff series.
I wrote about Zito here today. Long article short: Zito's a good guy to make fun of, the money was flushed down the organizational commode a long time ago, so all things being equal, I'm glad the organization has a fallback plan like Zito. As a fifth starter? Sounds good. As a sixth starter now that Ryan Vogelsong is Tom Seaver with a better fastball? Sounds good. As a fallback plan when Jonathan Sanchez needs to de-bad? Sounds good. I mean, not good. But not not good.
And today was a Zitonian special. An ill-timed home run, high pitch counts, but with enough location and tomfoolery to keep the Cubs off balance. And as much fun as I had watching Davis and Lopez, I don't take the Cubs' offense lightly. Against a lefty like Zito, Reed Johnson is basically Hank Aaron, Alfonso Soriano isn't so Feliz-ish, and there are guys like Aramis Ramirez and Starlin Castro floating around. It's not a joke lineup, and I thought Zito was going to have more trouble with them.
At the risk of angering a lot of folks, I think that Vogelsong and Zito are fairly similar in that they are total wizards when they have command, and kind of miserable when they don't. We didn't see the miserable Vogelsong command today, but you know it's inside him. He was walking hitters last year in triple-A at the same rate that Sanchez was this year. There's a wild hair in there that we haven't seen yet. Today with a bajillion-run lead, Vogelsong couldn't challenge hitters because his control was just a little wonky. I think we'll see a lot more of that, but he'll still be 100 times more than we ever could have hoped to expect.
Here's hoping that Zito can find whatever Vogelsong found when it comes to command. If not, he's Zito. And that's not a horrible thing. Tonight, it was a swell thing.