It was just a wispy little thing during Media Day. No way Tim Lincecum would stick with it for days, let alone weeks. His hipster tendencies are well-known, but it’s not like he’s acting in indie films on the side. He’s in a public job, one which requires him to be on camera just about every day, starting on March 31. The razor would do its work sometime before the crowds arrived in Scottsdale, no doubt.
Lincecum may be using a razor, but he’s keeping it away from the mustache he’s been “growing out” for at least a month.
His long hair seemed a little odd at first too, but that soon became his calling card. It helps when you’re young and no one can hit your fastball … or your changeup. But Lincecum made it cool to look like that kid from Dazed and Confused who got paddled by Ben Affleck and Co., so maybe if he pitches well in 2014 we’ll all look at the caterpillar above his upper lip and think, “Maybe it actually looked good this whole time.”
At the very least, we’re all going to have to get used it. Because every time his name is announced, either prior to a start or when he steps into the batter’s box, anyone in attendance will see this:
That photo was taken at the beginning of Spring Training. Things have changed since then. Here he is after his start on March 12. It’s hard to tell, but on this day the mustache had a little support from down below in the form of a soul patch.
But the soul patch was gone by the time his next start rolled around.
Here’s what he looked like during his most recent start, on Sunday afternoon:
And that’s your Tim Lincecum mustache update for now, and probably forever (or at least until he shaves it). Those who think this post was frivolous, ridiculous and completely unnecessary are probably right. I just feel like those who haven’t seen any photos yet deserve fair warning; it’s not every day a former Cy Young winner decides to start looking like Adam Morrison.
As for his performance on the mound, it’s time to wonder how long Lincecum is going to keep doing whatever he can to avoid walking guys. He walked just one batter and give up 11 hits, three homers and seven runs over 4.2 innings on Sunday, which covered up the strikeout total. Lincecum struck out seven* yesterday, increasing his total number of Cactus League strikeouts to 11 over 19.1 innings.
*(Two of those seven strikeouts came against Royals pitcher Yordana Ventura, who was clearly under orders to keep his bat on his shoulder.)
After pitching two scoreless innings in his first start of the Spring and three scoreless innings in his second, Lincecum’s results got progressively got worse over his last three starts. Are the pitchers ahead of the hitters early on? Is it the other way around? No one really knows, but Lincecum will surely put in more work studying hitters during the regular season than he has during these exhibitions (or maybe he’ll pay Chad Gaudin to write up the Cliffs Notes before every start).
Since Lincecum no longer has pure strikeout stuff, he’ll need to create/execute the right gameplans, keep the ball down, and hit both corners consistently. If he can do that, the mustache will look cool. Well, maybe … to a small segment of Giants fans who ride fixies and/or used to play small forward for Gonzaga.
