Tim Lincecum vs. Cliff Lee: battle of the top pitchers
Tim Lincecum is a pitcher for the San Francisco Giants. He has an average run rate of 3.04 and has 907 strike-outs. On the other hand we have Cliff Lee who is also a pitcher but he plays for the Philadelphia Phillies. He has an average run rate of 3.85 and
has 1085 strike-outs. At this point people would start comparing the two and reach to the conclusion that Cliff Lees ratings are better but he has a lot of years over Lincecum, so it will not be fair to judge on this basis alone. Let’s take a look at their
histories and their specialties and see what makes them as big as they are.
Cliff Lee was wanted by the very best baseball teams like the New York Yankees and the Texas Rangers but he ended up choosing the Philadelphia Phillies over the other two, even though they offered to pay much more lucratively. It is said that the 2008 season
was the career year for Lee and he definitely got noticed. He was the first pitcher to win six starts since Greg Swindell. He was named the American League Pitcher of the Year for his outstanding delivery and Lee is undoubtedly known to be one of the ten best
pitchers around in baseball.
Since the Phillies have had him on their team it makes the possibility of a pitching slump, which could add up and lead to defeat, highly unlikely. Lee has a knack of always staying in control. When the Mariners traded for Lee they believed that they were
getting one of the best pitchers there are, but what they didn’t know was that he would only get better with the passage of time. His statistics in 2010 have only risen in comparison to his scores of 2009 which were already pretty good. The average for pitches
for strikes is 63.5 percent, but Lee took it further and his average turned out to be an outstanding 72.6 percent.
The qualities that make Lincecum great are his low 90mph fastball and his sharp occasional slider. Tim also known as ‘the Freak’ has achieved a lot in just 26 years of age, the biggest of it being that he was with the Giants in their 2010 World Series championship
win, after a good wait of 50 plus years for the people of San Francisco.
It has been said that when Tim battled back in Game 5 of the World Series, it was one of the best moments of the series. His strike-out of 231 was the top last year. His power fastball and strong secondary pitches have established him as one of the elite
pitchers in the game. Some pitchers have off-speed pitches that they control really well, whereas others have off-speed pitches with enough movement and trick that they become very difficult to hit. Linecums specialty is that he can manage both very well,
giving him an edge over the others.
The play off between the Phillies and the Giants was highly anticipated and with that also came the comparison of Tim the Freak and Lincecum. In the 2010 season Lee put one of his best postseason performances while Tim on the other hand reestablished himself
as one of the best young elite pitchers. But in the final showdown between these two giants, who takes the lead?
As pitchers, both of them are world class. Their statistics are almost the same, give or take a few and that is something because Lee has had more time on the field as compared to Lincecum. When it comes down to their teams, the Giants definitely took the
victory over the Phillies even though they were considered to be the underdogs throughout the World Series.
Lee has proudly been wanted by the big names of the baseball community and obviously he has something to offer. The comparison between the two would continue for as long as they are playing and everyone would have a different opinion, but something that
everyone settles on is that both of these players are loaded with talent and are the best at what they do.
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