The starting pitchers have been doing the job for the defending world champion San Francisco Giants and Matt Cain sees no reason for that not to continue for the rest of the season.

Cain has been among the Giants top pitchers with a 7-4 record and 3.02 ERA. But he's joined by several other arms that have hurled the Giants to first place in the National League's West Division.

"The biggest thing is we're playing good defense and getting the big hits at different times," Cain said during a weekend series in Detroit. "We've been coming together."

Coming into action on Saturday, the 46-36 Giants had a three-game lead over Arizona. Barry Zito is the veteran pitcher on the staff but Cain and other hurlers like Ryan Vogelsong, 6-1 at 2.09, and Tim Lincecum, 6-6 at 3.04, have also been getting the job done.

Cain, scheduled to go after his eighth win on Tuesday at home against San Diego, is off to one of his best starts since his Major League career started with the Giants in 2005. He was 13-11 last season with an ERA of 3.14. The previous season, he was an All Star selection and had a 14-8 record with 2.89 ERA.

"I've been feeling good," he said. "The biggest thing is going deep into the game and throwing strikes earlier. That's always a good thing."

The Giants are currently the frontrunner in the division but Arizona isn't too far behind and Colorado is at striking distance at 6.5 games back. It's too early to count out Los Angeles and San Diego, currently 10 games behind.

"We feel it's going to be tight all year long," Cain said. "The other teams have some good pitching. We feel it will be close."

It will be critical, Cain said, to avoid any significant losing streaks.

"We lost five in a row a couple of weeks ago," he said. "We followed that up by winning the next seven."

Hot, humid weather is another challenge that pitchers like Cain have to deal with in upcoming weeks. Game time temperatures at Detroit on July 2 was 97 degrees.

"You know it's going to be warm," he said. "You just have to be conscientious of it. It's not that big of a factor."

But Cain admitted that it might not be a bad idea for pitchers to get ahead in the pitch count frequently when it's hot and humid.

"It depends on how the games goes," Cain said. "But you have to keep ahead in the count. You also have to stay healthy and pitch deep into the game."

Cain is comfortable with the abilities of the current Giants starting rotation to keep the team in the pennant race.

"We feel comfortable with each other," he said. "We have faith in our relievers, knowing they can get us out of certain situations."

That includes closer Brian Wilson who was leading the Majors, as of Saturday, in wins as a reliever with six and in saves with 24.

He's had a few hiccups, and battles with the water cooler of late, but Wilson is still among the top closers in the game.

Zito, meanwhile, remains a force after pitching six innings Saturday in a 15-3 in over Detroit and improving to 2-1. He had missed 61 games this season with a right mid-foot sprain sustained April 15 at Arizona.

"I agreed to go on three days rest and I wanted to hold up my agreement," said Zito, referring to his return from a 2 1/2 hour rain delay in the win over Detroit. "I was glad to go in and save the bullpen. The results were good today. There's a lot of things I can do better. I fell behind on a lot of guys today. I'll be working on that."

He's got some youngsters in the stable to keep up with, after all.

 

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