Tim Lincecum is still throwing a showcase on Friday. The Giants are still sending a representative to watch. This news hasn't changed. There is almost no reason to update this story.

Almost no reason.

Bruce Bochy confirmed before Wednesday's game that the Giants are more interested in Lincecum now than they might have been before the season started.

From Andrew Baggarly:

With Tim Lincecum preparing to throw for major league clubs on Friday, Giants manager Bruce Bochy made a big acknowledgment: The Giants’ level of interest in re-signing the beloved two-time Cy Young Award winner is greater now than it might have been a month ago.

Before you roll your eyes and grouse about another Lincecum article, please note that Vin Mazzaro is literally on the roster right now. The Giants let Yusmeiro Petit leave, Chris Heston was ineffective in his new role, there was a dash of deus ex rosterina, and now Mazzaro is the long reliever.

This isn't anything against Mazzaro, specifically. It's just to note that the Giants have a 12th pitcher on the roster who is mostly interchangeable with the Eric Hackers, Matt Palmers, and Brian Powells of the world. If you don't remember any of those names, that's the point. They started a game for the Giants in the AT&T Park era, and then they floated away with the breeze. There's about a .001-percent chance that Mazzaro becomes Ryan Vogelsong and a 99.999-percent chance he's Eric Hacker.

So as long as you're carrying one of those kind of interchangeable, unremarkable pitchers to be a long man ...

Well, finish the ellipsis, dummy. So as long as you have Mazzaro, you might as well pay $5 million for another one? Yeah, that wouldn't make sense, even though there's a merchandising element to Lincecum that other teams can't fold into their cost-benefit evaluation. Lincecum would have to impress the Giants, not just make them say yeah-I-guess-so.

And if he impresses the Giants, he'll impress another team. And if he impresses another team, they'll consider him as a starter, which is what Lincecum wants to be. The odds are still low.

But you have the Giants' manager saying it's likelier than it was. That's news, right?