ShareThisSo this is what a typical San Francisco Giants game was supposed to look like this season.
Lights-out pitching. Tight defense. And a scrappy, opportunistic offense.
Randy Johnson turning back the clock as a more visionary Big Unit than a vintage model was the bonus in the Giants' 2-0 defeat Sunday of his former team. That he had not faced Arizona in a big-league career that began in the last days of the Reagan administration made his throwing six innings of no-hit ball before giving up a double to Augie Ojeda on the first pitch of the seventh all the more impressive.
Especially considering how warm it was on the mound for the 45-year-old.
"It's nice to go out there and feel like you're contributing," said an understated Johnson, who entered the game lugging around an ugly 11.42 ERA from his first two starts, losses to Milwaukee and those dastardly Dodgers.
And what of the no-hit bid, as he's already authored two, including the 15th perfect game in modern major league history? Were his teammates starting to ignore him in the dugout, lest they tempt fate?
"Nah," he finally allowed, cracking a Cheshire cat grin. "I think they ignore me anyways."
Indeed, this is exactly what the Giants need more of if they fashion themselves serious contenders in the ultra-winnable National League West.
And Johnson was merely trying to keep pace with the Giants' previous two starting pitchers while flirting with history.
The Giants' staff took a deep breath after a horrendous six-game trip through San Diego and Los Angeles. The Padres and Dodgers swept the Giants by a cumulative 42-14, and San Francisco's purported strength, its rotation, was torched for 41 hits, surrendered 21 walks in 28 2/3 innings with an 8.79 ERA and went 0-5 with a no-decision. It then produced what was expected.
That is, three consecutive quality starts.
Friday night, Jonathan Sanchez threw 6 2/3 scoreless innings against the Diamondbacks in a 2-0 victory.
Saturday afternoon, reigning Cy Young king Tim Lincecum got his groove back with eight shutout innings and a career high-tying 13 strikeouts without a walk in a game blown by his bullpen, a 2-0 loss.
That set the stage for Johnson and his captivating performance.
Facing the team whose cap he should wear when he's enshrined into the National Baseball Hall of Fame -- Johnson won four of his five Cy Young Awards in the desert as well as the 2001 World Series -- he had sublime control of his slider and touched the mid-90s with his fastball.
He is no longer the fearsome, menacing, mullet-blowing-in-the-wind, flame-throwing phenom who had left-handed batters coming down with sudden cases of game-day Big Unit flu.
He no longer needs to be in order to be successful.
Or for the Giants to win games.
"Incredible," Giants manager Bruce Bochy said as he slowly shook his head. "Here he is at 45 and pitches a game like that. I thought he had a shot at (the no-hitter). He was really locating ... locked in out there.
"It was fun to watch ... at 45, it was pretty remarkable."
Just don't blow that smoke at the taciturn Big Unit.
"That kind of stuff is nice," Johnson said of no-no's and perfectos. "But winning is the most important thing."
One more "important thing" -- Johnson is a mere four victories from 300.
More performances like Sunday's, with tight defense and scrappy, opportunistic offense, and that distinction arrives in four more starts.
(Contact Paul Gutierrez at pgutierrez@sacbee.com.)
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
columnMust credit Sacramento Bee
