The additional pitches are a function of the lower velocity. He has to be craftier, more of a location pitcher than a guy with mean stuff. One point I totally agree with is the possibility of injury. There was talk of a sore elbow and throwing fewer sliders as a result. Tim's using that slider, so maybe he's got a tender elbow that may go bad as the season progresses, or he'll bag it and have one less pitch in his arsenal. He would be merely good without a slider and a 90 MPH fastball, compensating hopefully with maturity and a generally improved defense behind him.

I think a much better comparison should be of Lincecum's August slump of the 2009 season and this particular time frame right now. Its obvious to me that he has had some control issues and it would seem a bit more wise to show comparisons of that time period rather than a whole year versus a few weeks.

Tim has lost velocity because he dropped 20 + lbs over the winter. He uses alot of hip and weight shifting when he throws. To quote tim " my body does all the work and my arm comes along for the ride" there is no more weight behind his throwing style.

 @GaryF That's like taking the Big Mac off of McDonald's menu....

Actually knuckleballers, at least good ones,  "survive" by striking people out the same as any other types of pitchers.  Phil Niekro is 11th on the all time strikeout list.  Tim Wakefield had a k/9 of 6 over his career which is certainly reasonable and at his peak it was 7.5 - 8.  Avoiding bats is a pitcher survival skill and is a huge reason why Lincecum was so valuable in 2008 - 2009.

I share your concerns about the state of Lincecum's arm, but I have to say that Lincecum's current motion is anything but standard! Indeed, I remember reading an interview with his dad about this (who was a huge influence on developing his mechanics) - he said something to the same effect as you, that he felt that standard modern mechanics put massive strain on pitchers' elbows, and that Tim's mechanics had been deliberately designed to avoid exactly that!

I'm fearing the dreaded Tommy John may be invoked before next season begins. Down velocity, the slider hurting - those aren't good signs.

It seems like the majority of his early season woes can be attributed to not throwing the slider. His numbers in 2-strike counts have been awful this year, with hitter basically not losing any batting average at all, and that's the situation where the slider has been especially devastating.

If the slider hurts him before the season has even begun, and never hurt like this before, it indicates an injury of some kind. It's too bad the Giants couldn't be trend-setters in this regard, and start teaching their pitchers the known ways to hurl a ball that doesn't place all the stress on the elbow ligament. The 'standard' pitching motion is why TJ surgery is practically an eventuality for modern pitchers.

Timmy's gradual downfall, is that he fell madly in love with the STRIKEOUT! In theory, one could throw 27 "meatballs" up to the batters, and as long as they stay in the park, and are fielded properly, one could earn a Perfect-Game, with a minimum of 27 pitches. (This is how Major League, Knuckleballers can survive). Striking out 27 batters, requires a minmum of 81 pitches, and in reality, it would probably take double that amount (162), taking into account Balls & Foul Balls, and few pitchers in a regular weekly rotation, could effectively throw more than 120-130 pitches per game... So, by doing the math, you can see therein, where the problem lies!

(I know we said not to discuss fastball velocity but bear with me here because there's a method to the madness)

You can attribute the increased walk-rate partly because of his fastball velocity, more specifically how his decrease in fastball velocity makes the change-up less of a weapon for him.  When he was blasting it in there at 92+ with control, then the hitters had to respect that.  So when he throws the change-up, coming in at the low 80's, hitters would see the same arm action and react to it.  Swing-thru, strike 3, grab some pine meat.

Fast-forward to this year, 88-90 on the fastball with less control means that hitters are a) not as concerned with trying to swing and get the fastball cuz the control is not there and b) the difference between the fastball and change-up is not as great velocity wise.  Hitters then are not as inclined to swing at it, means more walks, increase in pitches per inning, and short outings for lincecum. 

Now that solution has been alluded to already, Lincecum needs to become a pitcher and not just a thrower.  He's gotta start throwing his specialty pitches for strikes, locate his fastball, and keep hitters off balance.

Don't know if you saw Adam Foster's piece on Lincecum in Rotoworld (http://www.rotoworld.com/articles/mlb/40399/8/low-velo-lincecum).  Caveats: I very frequently disagree with his scouting opinions (not infrequently serious disagreement).  And, there's a lot of stuff here that just seems blatantly wrong.  In particular the changeup not being a great pitch in 2009, and the slider (which my understanding is he didn't even throw until 2010) being a plus pitch in 2009.  Still, another viewpoint.

density curves!

Can you find LIncy's swing and miss rate and see where that trend is going? I feel like his fastball, though slower, has so much movement that people are still swinging and missing at an impressive rate.

This next comment is based solely on watching the games, so I may be way off base (no pun intended), but I seem to watch him have amazing swing throughs early in the count, and then he "pitches to contact" when he's up 2-2, 1-2, or even 0-2. I'm not sure if I'm right, and I've tried to find more on Fangraphs, but am I alone in the observation? Is there any evidence at all suggesting this is the case? Thanks, Chris.

I think the walk rate is the concerning part. Even when his velocity was 92-93 mph last year, he had a walk rate close to 4 from June to the close of the season last year, along with a declining strikeout rate. 

Personally, I think his mechanics are a little out of whack right now, which is leading somewhat to the decline in velocity and probably some of his other struggles as well. Even if he does get his mechanics ironed out, though, I don't think his velocity will return to what it was last year. His peripherals might just look more like the Tim Lincecum of July through September last year than the one from April through June. 

Couple of points. One obvious one is that there might be a pretty strong relationship between Lincecum's decline in velocity and the number of pitches he's throwing per inning (even allowing for a lot of random luck given the small sample size). That makes a lot of sense on the face of it - as fastball velocity declines they are generally more likely both to be hit well, and to be fouled off, than faster fastballs (depending on the amount of movement). It does seem like it's the fastball that's been causing Lincecum the most difficulty in terms of beating batters. I agree he can still be a very good pitcher at these velocities, but he may need to learn to pitch a little differently - a guy who can hit 96 can just hump it up and blow guys away when necessary, whereas if you're topping out at 93 you're got going to beat good batters as often that way. He may need to do a bit more finessing guys or throwing specialty pitches in different spots to what he's used to.

One other thing though is that of course it's early in the season. The graph compares a small sample from this year to the whole sample from 2011.  I do remember times in the past where his velocity has dropped then recovered, as he got his mechanics working fully. It could happen again (and did with Bumgarner too), though the current drop does seem fairly significant.

I definitely share your worries about his health, not just for the velocity issues but also the whole strange business about his slider. First he's not going to throw it at all this season to 'save his arm', then once he gets smacked around a bit without it, he is throwing it again. The Giants' communications about it all smack a bit of b.s., and my spidey senses/conspiracy tinfoil hat do lead me to wonder if the Giants are secretly trying to manage some sort of physical issue, whether with his arm or elsewhere. Though if that were the case you wouldn't think they would have thrown him out there again in the 8th in that last outing. Who knows, I guess we'll see as the season develops, but I'm also definitely a bit happy right now that we're not currently tied to a 5 or 6 year deal with Lincecum..