Giants’ best bet? Start Bumgarner in Game 7

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KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Madison Bumgarner should start Game 7.

It won’t happen, no way. Bruce Bochy assured me of that before Tuesday’s Game 6. So I’m not second-guessing Bochy’s plan to start Tim Hudson; I’m first-guessing the Hall of Fame-bound skipper.

The Giants’ best chance to win this World Series is to start the farmer.

Take it from someone who knows, the woman at the car-rental counter at the K.C. airport. I’m not saying this woman knows more baseball than Bochy. But she knows what she knows.

This woman told me she knows zero about baseball, never watches it, but she was with friends who were watching Sunday’s game.

“My friends were saying, 'Don’t worry, our guys will start hitting.’ I watched that man. The way he was pitching! It was amazing. I told my friends, 'I don’t think so. I don’t think they’re going to get hits from this guy.’”

So there are at least two of us here in Kansas City who believe Bumgarner should start Game 7. Bochy plans to use Bumgarner out of the bullpen, if needed.

Giants Madison Bumgarner watches a Royals Omar Infante double in the fifth inning during Game 5 of the World Series at AT&T Park on Sunday, Oct. 26, 2014 in San Francisco, Calif. Giants Madison Bumgarner watches a Royals Omar Infante double in the fifth inning during Game 5 of the World Series at AT&T Park on Sunday, Oct. 26, 2014 in San Francisco, Calif. Photo: Scott Strazzante, The Chronicle Photo: Scott Strazzante, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 113 Caption Close Giants’ best bet? Start Bumgarner in Game 7 1 / 113 Back to Gallery

Here was my question to Bochy during Tuesday’s pregame press chat (italics mine): Does Bumgarner have an unusual arm in terms of durability and all that stuff (nice folksy touch!) that would make it more feasible for him to do this comeback thing? And the second part of my question, would you give possibly any consideration to starting him tomorrow night if you come to a Game 7?

Bochy (very quickly): “Well, he’s not starting.”

Of course not. Starting Bumgarner would show a heartless lack of faith in Hudson, something a guy like Bochy is loath to do.

Bumgarner’s a team guy. He’s not hounding Bochy to start him. When I asked Bumgarner after the game if he would like to start Game 7, he said, “I’d like to see Timmy Hudson start the game. I think it’s a pretty awesome story for him.”

But sentiment is for Hallmark cards. (Made right here in Kansas City!)

Sentiment be damned. If you’ve got the best horse, load him in the starting gate.

Why?

•Bumgarner, though he’d have only two days’ rest, is fresh, ready, willing and apparently able. He has been saying for the past week that he feels better now than he has all season.

I asked Bumgarner if his arm really does feel as good as it has all season.

“Probably better,” he said.

•Bumgarner is a starter. Put him in his comfort zone, not in the bullpen.

•The young man is dealing on a celestial level. He is hotter than barbecue sauce.

•Who’s your World Series daddy? Bumgarner is 4-0 in three Fall Classics. In 31 innings, he has yielded one run. He seems to pitch well at harvest time.

•Nobody knows what Bumgarner has left in his tank, but what if he can go four innings? Or five? Why not get those innings from him up front?

•If Bochy let the Royals vote on the Giants’ starting pitcher for Game 7, Bumgarner would finish dead last on every ballot.

•His arm is not hanging by a thread. Giants pitchers Robb Nen and Brian Wilson blew out their arms in the World Series, but their arms were all but shot.

Bumgarner’s arm is not normal. He is a low-effort, low-stress thrower of baseballs. In HD close-ups when he’s pitching, Bumgarner doesn’t even perspire.

When I asked Bumgarner if he might be putting his arm at risk by pitching on short rest, he said, “No.”

How many pitches might he have in his arm for Game 7?

“Maybe 200,” he deadpanned. “I don’t know. Long as you’re getting outs. I feel like pitch counts are overrated, so whatever.”

As Bochy said Tuesday, “He uses his body well. He’s got great mechanics. A big, strong guy that, again, because of how he takes care of himself, he is resilient ... and that’s why at this stage of the game his stuff has not changed. He’s thrown the ball (in the playoffs) as well as he has all year.”

Is it humanly possible to start three games in one World Series? Don’t make me break out the stats.

There are three pitchers in the past 58 years who started three games in a Series and won all three: Lew Burdette (’57, 27 innings), Bob Gibson (’67, 27) and Mickey Lolich (’68, 27).

Did any of them blow out his pitching arm? Here’s the W-L records of those three the following season: Burdette 20-10, Gibson 22-9 and Lolich 19-11.

So based on scientific evidence, starting three games in a World Series actually makes your arm stronger.

Burdette, Gibson and Lolich pitched in the day of the four-man rotation, so they were accustomed to shorter rest. But that means that by Series time they had logged many more innings than Bumgarner has.

There is a Giants’ precedent: In 1905, Christy Mathewson started and won three World Series games. He had two days’ rest between starts 1 and 2, and one day of rest between starts 2 and 3.

Look, the Giants need to go down swinging.

Did Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid walk into that plaza in Bolivia with their arms held high in surrender? They did not.