How Tim Lincecum is honoring his late brother with Rangers

So much seems to be unknown with Tim Lincecum.

What role will the right-hander fill in the Texas Rangers' bullpen?

Will he be ready to open the season?

Can he recapture any or half or most of the form that allowed him to be a Cy Young-winning pitcher?

No one, not even Lincecum, has all the answers, but he believes and, apparently, so do the Rangers. Otherwise, he wouldn't be at the Surprise Recreation Campus with all these questions swirling around him.

One in particular, innocent on its face, leads to an answer that might be the best place to start with Lincecum and all the other questions.

What jersey number will he wear?

He's known far and wide for No. 55, which he had on his back when he pitched the San Francisco Giants to the World Series title in 2010 against his new team. This season, though, he will be wearing No. 44 so that he can take his late brother with him each time he goes to the mound.

The grieving and sorrow, the loss and memories, are shaping Linceum as much as his new Rangers uniform.

"The [story] behind that is, that was my brother's number as he became a coach, and was around kids a lot," Lincecum said. "He was a big part of my life, and I don't know, I just want to feel like I can carry him out there, and honor him, in a way, and have him close.

"It's been tough, but I think I have the right people around me. I have a good support group. My family has been closer than ever, recently, so with that they've helped me out and vice versa. So I think it's a ... I don't know . ... That's probably all I've got right there."

The pain from the unexpected death last month of Sean Lincecum isn't going anywhere soon. His funeral was Saturday in Seattle. Both of Lincecum's interview sessions have come to an end with the jersey talk and talk of his brother.

Most of his answers Wednesday, before his first official workout as a member of the Rangers, were framed around the effect the past two weeks have had on his status going forward.

Opening Day is March 29, and the Rangers are preparing contingencies in case he needs extra time after spring training.

"Obviously, I got sidelined with some stuff, personal issues, but I'm going to try to get off the mound here pretty soon," he said. "My regiment has been pretty strict without all this stuff going on right now, so we're just trying to stay with that and not get sidetracked. I'm not going to put it off the table, but like I said yesterday, I'm taking it one day at a time to see where I'm at and feel out where I fit best on this team and vice versa."

But Lincecum is going to pitch this season, and he will do so out of the Rangers' bullpen. He might be the long man. He might be the closer. He will be a ballplayer again, and maybe, considering what he's dealing with personally, that's his best role right now.

He's simultaneously filling the void he felt the past 18 months without baseball, since being designated for assignment by the Los Angeles Angels in 2016 and having surgery to repair his left hip, and using baseball to fill the void from the loss of his brother.

Lincecum has been working the past eighth months at a baseball facility near Seattle. He got his body back into baseball shape and got his mechanics back to where he felt he has more to give an MLB team.

There were enough guys there that they started referring to themselves as a baseball team that didn't play games. He was having fun, and he and his dad and his brother started talking a lot about baseball.

Lincecum looked up to his older brother, as all younger siblings do, and Sean became their father's first shot at inventing the perfect pitcher.

"If I was the 2.0, he was the 1.0," Tim said Tuesday. "My dad learned on him first. My brother was the kind of guy ... I bent and he broke. Different kind of body styles. He became a hitter and hit the [stuffing] out of the ball.

"As a baseball family, I'm around my dad a lot, and even with my brother up until the point that he passed, we were always talking about baseball. It's one of those things that is an itch in you. It's one of those things when you see everybody go down to spring training, it's like, 'We've got to migrate. I've got to head down.' I don't feel it's right if I'm not doing the same thing."

Lincecum has flown south for the rest of the winter. He's a ballplayer again, and, considering what he's dealing with personally, that's his best role right now.

"I kind of got sidetracked," Lincecum said. "I wouldn't say sidetracked, but we had a little more important issue at hand that kind of got in the way of the beginning of this. But I'm here now and definitely looking forward to this."

This story was originally published March 7, 2018 at 4:19 PM with the headline "How Tim Lincecum is honoring his late brother with Rangers."