Tim Lincecum and Roy Halladay have continued to pitch really well.
In his last three starts, Lincecum has pitched 22 and a third, given up six runs and struck out 32. He has just one win to show for it however, since the Giants bullpen has blown a lead in his last two outings.
Season stats: 4-0, 42.1 IP, 1.70 ERA, 0.83 WHIP, 8 BB, 56 K's
Halladay has motored right along, too. He suffered his first loss at the hand's of Lincecum's Giants, yielding five runs on ten hits but that was sandwiched between two complete game shutout's.
Season stats: 5-1, 49 IP, 1.47 ERA, 0.88 WHIP, 4 BB, 39 K's
Washington's Livan Hernandez is 4-1 with a 0.99 ERA, San Fran's Barry Zito (a 2002 AL Cy Young winner) is 4-0 with a 1.53 ERA and a trio of St. Louis guys rookie Jaime Garcia (3-1, 1.13 ERA), Brad Penny (3-1, 1.56 ERA) and Adam Wainwright (4-1, 1.96 ERA) have all been throwing really well.
But the biggest early-season challenger to the Lincecum-Halladay duel is Colorado pitcher Ubaldo Jimenez.
The big righty from the Dominican no-hit the Braves on April 17th and has barely blinked since. He has given up just 11 hits and one earned run in three starts since the no-no and had a 25-inning scoreless streak snapped the other night.
He was hitting 101 mph on the radar gun and struck out 13 Padres.
Season stats: 6-0, 41.1 IP, 0.87 ERA, 1.02 WHIP 16 BB, 41K's
Needless to say this is going to be a battle and when the smoke clears we may be picking between some of the best single-season pitching performances of all-time.
No one won 20 games last season in the National League and nobody since Curt Schilling in 2002 has struck out 300 batters. Both of those marks could fall. Stay tuned.
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