NEW YORK — The moment Tim Lincecum was drafted by the Giants, his phone blinked with a text message.

"I was like, 'Oh, it's happened,' " he said.

Then he calmly stepped to the 10th tee and ripped a 280-yard drive down the fairway.

Lincecum doesn't stress himself out, you might have noticed. When draft day arrived in June 2006, the last place he wanted to be was hunched over a computer, madly hitting the refresh button. He went for fresh air instead.

"I shot a 78, probably one of my best rounds ever," he said. "A good day."

If Lincecum had stayed in front of the computer screen's harsh glow, he would have watched nine players get selected before him — six of them pitchers.

None of those six is considered a front-runner for a Cy Young Award this season. None of them leads the league in strikeouts. None has landed a Sports Illustrated cover, either.

And although Luke Hochevar, Greg Reynolds, Brandon Morrow, Andrew Miller, Clayton Kershaw and Brad Lincoln could be productive pitchers in the major leagues, perhaps future All-Stars, none of them will join Lincecum today when he stands on the foul line at Yankee Stadium and tips his cap to millions.

On that same field 69 years ago, Lou Gehrig declared himself the luckiest man on the face of this earth.

With Lincecum, the Giants acknowledge they were lucky, too.

"He should have been gone before we picked," General Manager Brian Sabean said. "So by the time we got him, it was an easy, easy call."

By now you know that Lincecum is 5 feet 11 in his spikes, his uniform hangs off his slender yet deceptively strong body and he looks too young to buy a six-pack.

You probably also know a scouting bias exists against pitchers, especially right-handers who aren't 6-3 and built like a grain silo. The fact Lincecum had a delivery that flied in the face of baseball orthodoxy made scouts even more nervous.

Giants vice president Dick Tidrow first saw Lincecum in Corvallis, Ore., when Washington faced an Oregon State team that went on to win the College World Series. Nobody discovered Lincecum — his stuff was impossible to ignore — but Tidrow credited area scout Matt Woodward and West Coast crosschecker Darren Wittcke with writing up strong recommendations.

Tidrow soon echoed them.

"I loved the stuff and loved the athletic ability," Tidrow said. "I loved everything about him but his size."

Tidrow watched Lincecum throw more than 130 pitches against Oregon State. But he really wanted to see how Lincecum's arm would respond the next day. Tidrow sneaked into pregame workouts, and as the kid played long toss, Tidrow crept as close as he could get.

"I was basically standing on top of him," Tidrow said. "I was watching his face and there was no grunting, no grinding, no duress. It looked like a delivery he could repeat over and over, all day long if he wanted."

The delivery, a creation of Lincecum's father, Chris, "took some time for me to get used to," Tidrow said.

"But I realized how quick his arm is and how he repeats his arm slot. I thought it was going to work, so I had to put the size issue to rest."

Now it was time to convince Sabean, who had booked a flight to scout Lincecum. Tidrow begged him to rip up the ticket.

"Dick was agitated," Sabean said, smiling. "He said, 'Look, I'm afraid if you go, we'll really raise the flag. You can see enough on tape."'

Yet because of Lincecum's stature, Sabean said the Giants wouldn't have considered him unless they reached a consensus opinion. They did.

"Maybe we were one of the few teams to give him credit for what he was already doing: throwing 130 or 140 pitches in a start and playing catch like he hadn't even picked up a baseball the day before," Sabean said. "That's more than what we're willing to put someone through in professional baseball."

Then there was the subterfuge. Opposing scouts would engage Tidrow in conversation about Lincecum's "violent" delivery, joke about whether he'd hit puberty yet or label him a breakdown waiting to happen.

Tidrow would hide a smile under his handlebar mustache.

"Most of the time I tried not to say anything," he said. "I didn't want to lie and then take the kid."

It's a bit of a stretch, however, to suggest the Giants were smarter than everyone else. If Miller or Kershaw had been available, the club would have been torn about selecting either high school pitcher over Lincecum.

It's also worth noting that two of the pitchers taken in front of Lincecum already have undergone arm surgeries: Reynolds, the 6-7 Stanford alumnus who went second overall to Colorado; and Lincoln, the 6-0, 200-pound right-hander taken fourth by Pittsburgh.

Of the six pitchers taken before Lincecum, the most accomplished is Brandon Morrow. The 6-3 right-hander from Cal has a 1.76 ERA in 35 relief appearances for the Seattle Mariners.

But of all the teams to pass on Lincecum, the Mariners have heard the most wails and shrieks from their fans.

"You know what? I'm very delighted with the player we got," Mariners scouting director Bob Fontaine told the Seattle Times last year. "I'll say it again: He was the right guy for us."

A few months after the draft, Lincecum attended a Seattle baseball luncheon. Then-Mariners G.M. Bill Bavasi was there, too. While addressing the crowd, Bavasi pointed to Lincecum.

"He said it's too bad it didn't work out, how they would have drafted me and how great it would've been," Lincecum said. "I was sitting there thinking, 'Well, I was there for the taking.'

"But I'm not bitter about it. I think it's kind of funny that they got a pitcher from the Bay Area and I came here."

In the draft room, the Mariners' No.5 overall pick was the diciest for the Giants to sit through.

"They were close to the vest," Sabean said. "And they got to see him and know him better than anyone else."

One person wasn't surprised when the Mariners passed on Lincecum, even though he was the two-time Pacific-10 Conference pitcher of the year at Washington.

It was his father, Chris — his playing partner on the golf course that day.

"The Mariners, you know, they made their choice," said Chris Lincecum, who will watch his son from the stands at Yankee Stadium today. "Timmy is really happy. He's with a West Coast team and an excellent organization.

"The only negative thing is it would be nice to have him around town. I can't run down to my car and go see him.

"I miss the hell out of my son."