Tale of the tape session: Weaver baffles Bucs 7-0

Pittsburgh managed just four hits off the resurgent pitcher.

SEATTLE (AP) — Jeff Weaver was mired in perhaps the worst stretch of his up-and-down career. So he decided to look at film.

While on the disabled list last month, smarting over an 0-6 record and 14.32 ERA as much as right shoulder tendinitis, Weaver viewed films of when he set a career high with 14 wins two years ago with the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Weaver gave his former Dodgers manager — and all in Seattle who have been waiting impatiently — a show by throwing a startling four-hitter Wednesday night as the Mariners beat the Pittsburgh Pirates 7-0 to end their six-game losing streak.

“I’ve seen him pitch games like that,” confirmed Jim Tracy, the former Dodgers manager now at the helm in Pittsburgh. Tracy saw Weaver’s last complete game, Sept. 17, 2005, and last shutout, five days before that.

But no one in Seattle had seen anything remotely close to this. Weaver entered the game scorned for eight winless starts and a 10.97 ERA that had actually improved by nearly four runs since he watched those old Dodgers tapes of him going 27-14 in 2004 and ’05.

Mowing them down

Weaver (1-6) became the first Seattle starter to win since June 3 by retiring 16 consecutive Pirates at one point. He used an array of spinners thrown from all arm angles, vintage stuff he features only when he’s feeling his best. It’s been shelved since last October.

He allowed a single to Jack Wilson leading off the third, and then picked him off. No Pirate got a hit against him until Ronny Paulino’s double with two outs in the eighth. Only two of the first 24 Pirates to bat against Weaver even saw ball three, let alone first base.

By the eighth, the same home fans who were booing Weaver mercilessly last month gave him a standing ovation as the left field scoreboard beamed “DREAM WEAVER” in huge letters. He got another standing ovation when he took the mound for the ninth — and a third when he got Jason Bay to line out softly with two on to end the game.

XThursday’s Pirates-Mariners game wasn’t completed in time for today’s edition.