Barry Zito is going through deliveries like frat houses go through 30-racks of beer. The latest version is supposed to add drop and drive to his delivery, giving him more momentum toward the plate, and perhaps putting some extra gas on his mediocre fastball.
Unfortunately for the Giants, their $126 million man is not an old dog up to new tricks. Zito has been using this trick—claiming he has altered his mechanics—for five years, giving fans futile hope that he might finally reinvent himself. It has not worked to date, and it probably will not work in 2012.
Zito is coming off a disastrous 2011 campaign, during which injuries limited him to just 53 2/3 big-league innings. He allowed 10 home runs and issued 24 walks over that span, and was generally terrible, with the exception of an early-July surge buoyed by BABIP luck. A portion of that ineffectiveness can be written off on the mid-foot sprain Zito suffered in April, so the 33-year-old deserves some benefit of the do...
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