Scottsdale, Ariz. --

Barry Zito can pitch well this year. He can pitch well next year. For that matter, Zito has the tools to pitch into the 2020s.

That opinion comes not from a Giants public-relations person or a team executive who has his thumbprints on Zito's seven-year, $126 million contract. Nor does it come from the offices of Zito's agent, Scott Boras.

This nervy statement was made by one of the most notable names in pitching over the past quarter-century, a man who has counseled Randy Johnson, Nolan Ryan, Orel Hershiser, Robb Nen, Cole Hamels and other A-list pitchers.

He is Tom House, who pitched for the Braves, Red Sox and Mariners in the 1970s before he became a big-league pitching coach and earned a doctorate in psychology. At 64, he remains a sought-after private coach.

House knows eyes will roll when he or anyone else speaks glowingly of Zito, given the pitcher's history in the five seasons since he moved from Oakland to San Francisco.

"The skepticism is well-deserved," House said by phone from Los Angeles. "In any sport you're only as good as your last pitch, catch or throw. But I'm a firm believer that in today's world you can pitch into your 40s. Barry is 33. From what I know about him physiologically, there is no reason he can't be like Jamie Moyer and pitch into his 40s. What he has to do is optimize what he has as he goes through the aging process.

"I'm always optimistic. I think he'll be just fine. He might not be a Cy Young again, but he definitely can continue for the next 10 years."

Jamie Squire/Getty Images

House does have a horse in this race.

He has worked with Zito sporadically since 1998, when the left-hander was pitching at USC. House has a for-profit coaching business called the National Pitching Association. He also has a nonprofit research center devoted to the science of pitching called the Rod Dedeaux Research and Baseball Institute.

The institute, located on the USC campus, was Zito's home away from home this winter. He and 20 other pitchers were there almost every weekday morning from the end of October until just before spring training.

House gave Zito more hands-on instruction than he ever had before.

Emerging from these sessions were Zito's new crouched delivery out of the stretch, his efforts to maintain the same arm slot for each pitch and to pitch more aggressively near the plate, and a mental approach that demands Zito block out everything but the next pitch he throws.

A sellout crowd of 11,834 saw some of the results at Scottsdale Stadium on Saturday when Zito held a Milwaukee Brewers split-squad to one infield single in three shutout innings. He walked none, struck out one and hit Nyjer Morgan on the helmet with a curveball, sending him out of the game.

Zito had a lot on his plate this winter, particularly a December wedding, but felt this was the right time to return to his pitching roots.

He recalled how before he turned pro, he would always be pitching - in high school, in summer league, in college.

"At some point you get into this thing where you have an offseason and you stop throwing and take a couple of months off," Zito said.

"For me it was about going back on the hill a couple of weeks after the season and staying on the hill all offseason and facing hitters multiple times and working on things, trying tons of different stuff and seeing what works and what doesn't."

It might sound as though Zito was doing an end-around past Giants pitching coach Dave Righetti and bullpen coach Mark Gardner, who have invested much of themselves into trying to make Zito better over the past five years. In fact, the Giants coaches doubtlessly have been trying to drill the same points into Zito's mind.

Zito said he will lean heavily on Righetti and Gardner during the season, when House is out of the picture, adding that most pitchers go home for the winter and tinker, sometimes with private coaches.

"Because it's Tom House, it might be a bigger story and a bigger deal," Zito said.

House cannot guarantee wins. He calls himself a "tour guide" who merely points the way. But he is high on Zito, especially on the mental side, because the pitcher has made "huge gains" in not worrying about the past.

Zito has acknowledged that he cared too much what others thought of him, which might be nice in the real world but not on the mound, when a pitcher needs to focus on nothing beyond his next pitch.

Giants fans have heard all this before. The proof will come every fifth day in 2012, and though House sees Zito pitching into the next decade, Zito is not even thinking about the next inning.

That was evident on a morning early in camp, when Zito politely made it known he did not appreciate a reporter asking if he was worried the Giants might cut him this year if he does not improve.

"No, one day at a time for me," he said. "I'm not getting ahead of myself, buddy."