The Freak

When my son and I were in Arizona a couple weeks back taking in some Spring Training games, Tim Lincecum, aka The Freak, came into our middle game in relief of Santiago Casilla who had relieved starter Madison Bumgarner.  The reaction of the crowd was by far the loudest, craziest and most surprising in the 2 games we attended. It was almost like the reaction a rock band gets when it comes out on stage.  Timmy is loved by the Giants fans and even my son and I got caught up in the excitement.

Lincecum has been hyped this year because he worked out all off season with his dad and seems to have a little of him magic left.  Despite giving up 2 runs in his 2 innings I saw, he look pretty good in striking out 5 of the 6 batters he retired.  The Giants need him to bounce back to some degree if they have any playoff chances.

I am not necessarily counting on Lincecum but could sure use some solid stats out of him in my fantasy league.  We have a very deep (12 teams with rosters of 40) keeper league where every player remains on your team year to year with 2 chances to draft - preseason and midseason.  I traded for Lincecum a couple years back hoping for a bounce back and getting very little production.  We are finalizing our draft right now I have decided to take a flier and hold onto The Freak, just in case.

Lincecum's cards have dropped significantly in price over the last few years in parallel with his performance decline.  I didn't record the price of these 4 relics I am sharing in this post but I am certain that none of them cost more that $5.  There was a time when his rookie base cards couldn't be found at that price.  I have filled many of my base card gaps for his rookie year but still needing his 2007 rookie cards from Bowman Chrome, Bowman Chrome Draft, Bowman Heritage, SP Rookie Edition (card #214), Topps 52 Chrome and 3 UD Elements cards.

I have a couple Timmy Autos in my collection but I am thinking it may be time to seek out those rookie cards and a few autos for my collection with the prices down just in case.  You never know, if he bounces back to Cy Young form the Giants could be dangerous.