Tuesday, April 18, 2006

 

In Appreciation of TIMMAH!!

I have a confession to make.

I really didn't appreciate Tim Worrell the first time around.

Yeah, pretty stupid, huh?

Let me offer a few feeble words of explanation. In 2003, we all expected the almighty Robb Nen to return Real Soon from his shoulder injury. I didn't understand--or maybe I couldn't accept--that "Smoke On The Water" was gone for good, having given his all to get the Giants into the 2002 World Series. Tim Worrell was just supposed to hold down the fort until Nen, the gold standard of Giants closers, returned.

Worrell was not Nen, and he never could be. A classic Nen save was three up, three down, with batters flailing away at filthy sliders in the dirt. No muss, no fuss, log the save and the win and let's all go home. In his honor, we called the final inning of the game "the Nenth Inning."

Worrell took a different route to his saves. He'd put on a guy or two almost every time he took the mound. He wouldn't let me relax; he made me grit my teeth and pull on my hair until he finally got the last out. He got the job done more often than not, but I hated how he did it. He wasn't dominant like Nen. He wasn't dominant like a real closer. He was just that jerk who wasn't Robb Nen. He went through a bad stretch late in the year, including one horrible day in Montreal where he gave up a grand slam to lose the game. That was the last straw. "Anyone but Worrell!" was my rallying cry.

As the saying goes, "be careful what you wish for." Worrell went to Philly for 2004. Matt Herges took over and did a swan dive into the concrete. I had thought Worrell was bad? I had no idea what "bad closer" meant until Herges showed me. Then we got Dustin Hermanson and Tyler Walker as stopgaps. The Nenth Inning became a horrow show for two straight years. Just look at the ERA+ of the guys we've had closing since Nen's last year. (Remember, an ERA+ of 100 means you're average compared to the rest of the league; higher numbers are better.)

2002 Robb Nen 172
2003 Tim Worrell 149
2004 Matt Herges 85
2004 Dustin Hermanson 98
2005 Tyler Walker 98

Clearly, I was full of crap. You don't get many second chances in life--at least, that's what they say. Thanks to the brilliance of Brian Sabean and the fragility of Armando Benitez, I have a second chance to appreciate Tim Worrell, to embrace Tim Worrell, to love Tim Worrell.

Welcome home, Tim Worrell. Mea culpa. May you reign over the Nenth Inning for many years to come.

Jefferson 9:23 AM

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