Colorado’s Ubaldo Jimenez to face San Francisco’s Tim Lincecum on Memorial Day

Your ace,our hope

The best pitcher in baseball against the two-time defending Cy Young winner: What might be at stake? For the San Francisco Giants, nothing but the franchise.

Ubaldo Jimenez and Tim Lincecum meet in a Memorial Day showdown in San Francisco, a coming-out party for the Colorado Rockies’ ace. Jimenez is 9-1 with an 0.88 earned-run average, and he gave up two hits in the loss. He has a one-hitter and a no-hitter and scoreless streaks of 25 innings and 17 innings.

“He’s just started to be the best,” Colorado Manager Jim Tracy said. “He is as quality a human being as you would ever want to be around. He is humble, soft-spoken and accountable. He has all the attributes to be a star in this game for years to come.”

The last pitcher with nine victories in his first 10 starts and an ERA under 1.00: Hall of Famer Juan Marichal, 44 years ago.

Lincecum was the one drowning in a sea of superlatives for the last two years, and up until two weeks ago. He has failed to pitch beyond five innings in consecutive starts, giving up 11 runs and 10 walks in 9 2/3 innings, and the Bay Area is grasping for an answer: a blister, a mental lapse, a mechanical flaw, something.

With all that trouble, his ERA has risen from 1.76 to 3.00. That would not incite panic elsewhere, but the Giants have scored the fewest runs in the National League West.

They promoted touted catcher-first baseman Buster Posey on Saturday, and in him they hope. In Lincecum they trust, desperately.

Let it go,let us go

Subtle hints have not worked, so the biggest stars on the Houston Astros are practically shouting in the ear of owner Drayton McLane: Give it up and rebuild.

The Astros are on their third manager in four years. They have the worst record in the NL, the worst run differential in the majors. Attendance has dropped 30% since 2006, the year after the Astros played in their lone World Series.

Lance Berkman, a lifelong Texan and five-time All-Star, said he might waive his no-trade clause. Roy Oswalt, the ace, has asked for a trade.

The Astros aren’t taking offers for Oswalt. General Manager Ed Wade says this year’s team can win. McLane has a bit of Al Davis in him — never concede, never rebuild.

So bless Berkman for not falling back on cliché in discussing an offense that has scored the fewest runs in the majors and ranks last in batting average (.231) and home runs (25).

“You can say we’re in a slump, you can sugarcoat it all you want,” Berkman told the Houston Chronicle, “but we’re just not good.”

The stainthat lasts

The steroid era might be over, but every now and then comes a reminder that jolts baseball out of its celebratory present and back to its dreary past.

Brian McNamee, the trainer who says he injected Roger Clemens with performance-enhancing drugs, testified last week before a grand jury investigating whether Clemens committed perjury by telling Congress he never had taken steroids or human growth hormone. Jose Canseco is set to appear before the grand jury this week.

If Clemens is charged with perjury, the only seven-time Cy Young Award winner would join baseball’s only seven-time most valuable player, Barry Bonds, under indictment for lying about drug use. To quote the late Mel Allen: How about that?

— Bill Shaikin