Weaver looms large in M's win

On this night, the postgame hugs were a little tighter, the handshakes a little heartier.

"Dream Weaver" drifted over the loudspeakers at Safeco Field, and Jeff Weaver basked in the knowledge that he still has it, still has some of the arsenal that made him a key figure in the World Series last year.

Beat up like a bad heavyweight for most of his three months with the Mariners, Weaver got off the deck Wednesday night. He threw a four-hit 7-0 shutout at the Pittsburgh Pirates at Safeco Field, halting a six-game Seattle losing streak.

Jeff Weaver, stopper. Roll that one around your tongue a bit.

His teammates pulled for him, never more than in the ninth inning on a couple of hustle plays. When it was done, manager Mike Hargrove admitted to some emotion. Weaver was a guy winless in six decisions with an unthinkable 10.97 earned-run average.

"I'm a pretty emotional person," Hargrove said. "The people who really know me understand that. I had a big lump in my throat from about the seventh inning on.

"It's good to see good things happen to good people."

For his part, Weaver was relatively unemotional, saying that going through adversity before helped him stay grounded through his hellish spring.

"You don't change things overnight," he said. "It's a gradual thing. My last two starts have helped me gain the confidence and helped me feel good physically. Today was the day it just came together."

Indeed, he had shown positive signs against San Diego June 9 and the Chicago Cubs six days later. But those were just warmups to an evening when, facing a third straight National League club, he came at the Pirates from several different arm angles, broke off good breaking pitches and tied them up with a rising fastball.

"I'm not afraid to throw a couple of different pitches from different arm slots," Weaver said.

He had been so bad before going on the disabled list May 11 with shoulder tendinitis that the move was widely scorned as a ruse to deflect the depths of his horrific start. But Weaver insists he didn't feel good physically early in the year.

"I felt I was making too many quality pitches to get crushed the way I was," he said. "The last three starts, I can tell the stuff's got a lot of life, there's a lot of sharpness on the off-speed stuff."

Weaver threw just 62 pitches through five innings, 81 through seven. He went out for the ninth with a crowd of 23,553 clamoring behind him, urging him toward his first shutout since Sept. 12, 2005, when he was a Los Angeles Dodger.

He walked Jose Bautista leading off, and after one out, Freddy Sanchez doubled into the left-field corner. Raul Ibanez got to the ball quickly and held Bautista at third.

Then Adam LaRoche hit a looping foul fly behind third, on which Adrian Beltre made a picturesque, over-the-shoulder catch for the second out.

"You won't see a better play than the one A.B. made on the foul ball," Hargrove said.

Fittingly, Weaver had to face the best Pirate, outfielder Jason Bay, to finish it. He broke Bay's bat on a soft liner to short and it was over, except for the prolonged hugs and heartfelt slaps.

"The guy's a fierce competitor," Ibanez said. "You see he prepares, he really works hard.

"I think this game is such a beloved game because it's a lot like life. You've got to prepare to ride out the storms and work through them. To his credit, he's done that. You never heard him gripe, so you're really pulling for him."

Or, as reliever George Sherrill put it, "Just looking at his numbers, even the guy who's having the worst year ever can't have numbers like that without having a lot of bad luck. If he gives up a hard-hit ball that's in the gap, it's going to score a couple of runs because there's a couple of bleeders in there.

"The guy's just had unbelievable bad luck. He needed something like this, for sure."

Weaver swamped two other story lines. Hargrove held a team meeting Tuesday night after a loss to Pittsburgh, and Ibanez said he thought the Mariners played with more energy in breaking the losing streak.

They did it off a revised batting order, as Hargrove dropped Richie Sexson to seventh, put designated hitter Jose Vidro in the No. 8 hole and had catcher Kenji Johjima hitting fifth.

Sexson and Ibanez poled long home runs, and for a night, it worked, all of it. The loudspeaker segued from "Dream Weaver" to Free's old tune, "All Right Now."

For Weaver, if not all right now, at least it's a start.

Bud Withers: 206-464-8281 or bwithers@seattletimes.com