How is asking a pitcher to get batters out and locate his pitches coddling? That's called asking a pitcher to do his job. This is professional baseball. He simply didn't do his job.
Lee is a good pitcher. He made the All-Star team this year (not picked by the media mind you), and he went 12-9 with an ERA of 3.18 and for the year, he had only 18 walks all year with 185 K's and he lead the league with 7 complete games. As I mentioned, he also won the Cy Young a couple of years ago and had 22 wins.
But let's be honest, he has made his living and reputation on the playoffs. And in the playoffs, before Renteria's home run, he had given up only one home run in his postseason career. And coming into tonight, his record for the postseason was 7-1 (now 7-2) with an ERA of 1.96 and 74 K's in 69 innings.
I give the Giants all the credit in the world for beating him twice. The only time anyone has ever hit him in the postseason was game one of the World Series. Other than that, he was 2-0 in the division series with an ERA of 1.13 against the Rays, and he shutout the Yankees with 13 K's in his only appearance in this years postseason.
And considering that Renteria had only hit 3 home runs in the regular season all year, the fact that Lee had gotten Renteria out twice up until that point including a strike out, I don't think trying to get him out was a bad move at all. But Lee should have executed better.