After years of being labeled baseball’s most overpaid pitcher, Zito
took the ball Wednesday night and thoroughly outshined reigning AL MVP
and Cy Young Award winner Justin Verlander to lead the San Francisco
Giants to an 8-3 victory over the Detroit Tigers that sent the
orange-crazed home fans into a Zito-fueled frenzy.
‘‘You can’t let your nerves get to you. You can’t go out and try to
make things happen,’’ Zito said. ‘‘You can’t go try to strike guys out
or get ground balls. You just have to take every pitch one at a time and
give everything you've got to each pitch and let baseball play out from
there.’’
Three home runs from Pablo Sandoval only helped Zito’s cause in Game 1.
The left-hander watched his teammates clinch the World Series title
two years ago in Texas, never playing a part on the field that
postseason after he was left off the roster. That was all the motivation
he needed to revive his career in his early 30s.
Now, he has the Giants one win closer to another championship after a
dazzling World Series debut. Zito has just about earned his $126
million contract in a sensational span of six days. A hefty chunk of it,
anyway.
‘‘I battled in September to make the postseason roster,’’ Zito said.
‘‘The last thing I would have expected at that point was to be starting
Game 1. Just the opportunity was just magical. To be able to go up
against Verlander and give our team a chance to go up 1-0, and the fact
that we won, it’s just kind of surreal. It’s just a pleasure to be a
part of it all.’’
Last Friday night at Busch Stadium, Zito pitched a season-saving 5-0
victory against St. Louis and sent the Giants home trailing the
defending champion Cardinals 3-2 — and they rallied again to reach a
second World Series in three years.
For anyone who doubted Zito could deliver on the big October stage,
while facing the daunting task of dueling with Verlander, he didn’t
flinch once. And when two-time NL Cy Young Award winner Tim Lincecum
came out of the bullpen to replace him in the sixth, Zito ran off to a
roaring standing ovation and offered a quick tip of his cap before
disappearing into the dugout.
During his 2012 transformation back to reliable starter, the
33-year-old Zito never wanted the focus to be on him or how he’s
accomplished this remarkable comeback but rather what he could add to
make the Giants a winner and playoff contender again. And, possibly, win
another World Series ring along the way.
Nobody is questioning Zito’s talents now. His line of one run on six
hits, three strikeouts and a walk in 5 2-3 innings was hardly
spectacular — but it rarely is for Zito. He is doing just what manager
Bruce Bochy asks of him: giving the Giants a chance to win.
‘‘Especially in the down times, he could not have been more of a
high-class, respectful, dignified professional,’’ Giants CEO Larry Baer
said. ‘‘I think the reason 43,000 are cheering Barry are the reasons
that all of us in the front office and clubhouse are so ecstatic about,
is good things happen to good people. The temptation in sports is to
blame somebody else when things go down — the pitching coach or the
manager, the ballpark, the league, the this, the that — he never once
(did). He always said, ‘It’s on me, and I'm going to own it and figure
it out.’ And here we are.’’
Zito even added an RBI single in the fourth, following up his bunt
base hit in Friday’s win, as Giants starting pitchers drove in a run for
the fourth straight game.
This is the ultimate win for Zito, years in the making. Not that he will say it quite that way. That’s not how he operates.
When a struggling Zito was told he wasn’t going to be on the
postseason roster in 2010, in one of Bochy’s toughest conversations with
a player, the pitcher immediately went to work. He threw a bullpen
session, he kept himself ready if needed — but never got the chance. It
hurt to the core, even if he never said it.
He tried different deliveries and pitching motions, he added a cutter
to his repertoire to give him four solid pitches to keep hitters
guessing.
In front of a sellout crowd at AT&T Park on this night, he
pitched first to chants of ‘‘Barry! Barry!’’ and later to hollers of
‘‘Zito! Zito!’’ Who could have seen this memorable World Series moment
coming for Zito, only two years after all the boos, from every
direction, in his home ballpark?
The Giants have won Zito’s last 14 starts, and he hasn’t lost since
Aug. 2 against the Mets. Zito went 15-8 this season for his most
victories since joining the Giantclick
