Arizona Diamondbacks 12, San Francisco Giants 2: Ray-pocalypse Now

Record: 23-23. Pace: 81-81. Change on 2025: -1.

I’ve learned not to tempt the baseball gods by starting on the recap too early. The only time I did so far this season, was the game against the Orioles, where the D-backs led 7-2 in the middle of the sixth inning. It… did not end well. But I did feel tonight, with Arizona ahead by ten runs after five innings, that I could safely boot up the laptop on this one. It was not former Diamondback Robbie Ray’s night. He had only allowed more than six ER once in his career: he gave up seven in just his fourth MLB appearance, back in 2014. It was his worst Game Score too, at 11. But tonight? The D-backs plundered him for 10 runs, 9 earned on 11 hits and 2 walks in just 4.2 innings. The resulting Game Score? 2.

This was an absolute palate-cleanser for the recently struggling offense. Giving a pitcher who came in with a 3.04 ERA, a career-worst outing, is something I hope the “Why do we always make scrubs look like Cy Young winners?” crew remember. Things tonight started early, and extremely quickly. And by quickly, I mean after a 1-2-3 inning by Zac Gallen in the top of the first, six pitches into the bottom half, Arizona had a 4-0 lead. Ketel Marte singled on an 0-1 pitch, Corbin Carroll singled on his first offering, and Geraldo Perdomo reached after he grounded the first pitch off the glove of the Giants’ third-baseman. That set the table for Nolan Arenado, whose ownership of Robbie Ray was close to Goldy/Timmeh levels: 53 career PA and a 1.244 OPS. That increased after this:

It was only the second time in franchise history that our fourth batter of the game had hit a grand-slam. The previous occurrence had been on April 28, 2011 against the Cubs at Wrigley. From the SnakePit recap: “Chris Young led off the bottom with a double, and suddenly, Dempster couldn’t find the strike zone with the help of a native guide. Kelly Johnson drew a walk, and after a LOUD foul ball into the cheap seats, Justin Upton was hit by a pitch, loading the bases for cleanup hitter Stephen Drew. [He] took [Ryan] Dempster to the bank, depositing a fastball into the outfield seats for his first career Grand Slam.” That did take more pitches: nineteen, so more than three times the number to reach tonight’s lickety-split slam.

Okay, having spent over four hundred words and not even reached the first D-back out, I’d better gallop on through the rest of the game. It seemed initially like Gallen might be a little shaky, allowing San Francisco get on the board in the second, then another run in the third. But Arizona had no trouble responding on each occasion. They scored one in the second on a Marte sacrifice fly, then added two more in the third. That came courtesy of a rare Tim Tawa start, who singled home both runs. But the game was ended as a meaningful contest by the D-backs getting a five-run fifth. Gabriel Moreno had a two-run homer, Ryan Waldschmidt and Marte added RBI knocks, and Arenado drove in our twelfth and final run on another of the Giants’ three errors.

Thereafter, it became a bit reminiscent of a spring training game. We pulled Carroll, Arenado and it looked like we were perhaps going to end replacing Moreno with James McCann. I say that, because the last-named did potentially make this a bit of a Pyrrhic victory [to re-purpose one of last year’s popular recap titles]. After a half-inning spent playing 1B McCann, trying to leg out an infield hit, appeared to tweak something in his leg. While he did get the hit, bringing him back over the Uecker Line, he had to be lifted from the game immediately. Adrian Del Castillo took over for him on the basepaths, and Moreno stayed in the game. No word on McCann as yet.

Gallen got through six innings with no more damage, allowing four hits and a walk with five strikeouts, for his first quality start since April 1. At 81 pitches, he could perhaps have gone deeper. But the bullpen probably needed the work. Ryan Thompson, Brandyn Garcia and Jonathan Loaisiga each tossed scoreless innings to close out the Diamondbacks’ first double-digit margin of victory since the 10-0 win over the White Sox last June 23. However, let’s not get too carried away with ourselves. The Giants do have the second-worst record in the league, and we should be shutting down their offense. Their 167 runs is twenty-five fewer than any other NL team.

But tonight was one for the Arizona offense: 16 hits in total, tying a season high every starter notching one by the end of the fifth. Waldschmidt had three hits, a walk and two stolen bases, while there were two-hit games for Marte, Carroll, Ildemaro Vargas and Moreno. The win pulls the Diamondbacks back up to .500, and with nine more games against these woeful Giants and Rockies (3-1 so far) before we face anybody else, I’m hopeful the team will be able to take advantage of this stretch of the schedule and get well above even by the time we start seeing other franchises.

Click here for details, at Fangraphs.com
Colonel Kurtz: Nolan Arenado, +14%

Seriously, that’s it. Nobody else bar Arenado came in at better than plus seven percent, and nobody at all reached even negative one percent, so I’m not going to call anyone out. It was, I’d say, probably the best-played game by the Diamondbacks all season. Fine pitching (the quality of the opposition notwithstanding), great hitting and solid defense. Hard to ask for much more. I’ll give comment of the night to Webb Gemz, not least for demonstrating the correct use of the sarcasm font.

Same two teams tomorrow, same bat-time (6:40 pm), same bat-channel, and I would not mind at all if it were to be the same bat-result. It’ll be Ryne Nelson taking the mound for the Diamondbacks.